


To Hold Chaos

by blindmasks



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angst, Anxiety, Blood Lust, Blood and Injury, Chronic Illness, Chronic Pain, Demons, Depression, Hurt/Comfort, I literally made an entire magic system just so I could torture Levi, M/M, Magic, Medical Procedures, Pain, Panic Attacks, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, but not in a vampire way
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:27:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 35,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23589151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blindmasks/pseuds/blindmasks
Summary: Erwin is an ex-soldier hunting titans when he meets Levi, the most powerful Chaos mage that he has ever encountered, in a back alleyway of the underground, a ring of bodies on the ground around him.Levi is twenty-two, approximately three minutes before first meeting Erwin Smith, when he starts turning into a demon.Or, Levi has a rare magical condition which is slowly turning him into a demon, and requires painful but life saving treatments to counteract it. Meanwhile, Erwin and co are on a mission to hunt down the Witch who's been creating titans for what appears no other reason than uninhibited destruction. Levi's condition continues to progress and worsen while they try to find both a cure and a way to stop the titan attacks.
Relationships: Levi/Erwin Smith
Comments: 20
Kudos: 77





	1. Smith and the Witch

**Author's Note:**

> So instead of writing all my other stories, I wrote this. 
> 
> This story will jump around time wise, so it shouldn't take too long before Levi and Erwin are together. It started as just an excuse to torture Levi but then it grew a plot, so here we go. Either way, still a lot of hurt/comfort to come - this will get more intense in later chapters. Please read tags for warnings.
> 
> You don't have to read this to read the story, but if you get confused, here's a note on the magic:
> 
> 8 types, a person can only have one type (except for Chaos):  
> Life - speed, agility, strength, improved senses, healing, and in the very powerful, a grey mist which can solidify into any shape  
> Psychic - "spidey sense" type danger detection, telepathy, empathy, mind reading, mind control, enhanced intelligence  
> 4 elementals, Air, Water, Fire, Earth  
> Witchery - potions, spells, rituals, runes, etc  
> Chaos - all seven other magics
> 
> A note on people:  
> (3 is highest power, 1 lowest)  
> Levi - Chaos 3  
> Erwin - Psychic 3  
> Hange - Witch 3  
> Mike - Life 3  
> Furlan - Life 1  
> Isabel - Air 2

9 Spring

Underground, Inner East

Kenny tells Levi he’s taking him to see a doctor.

“But I ain’t sick,” Levi says. He sits on the kitchen table, pausing to look up at Kenny as he peels an apple in a perfect spiral with his penknife.

“It’s a different type a’ doctor,” Kenny says, grabbing his hat. “Now hurry up, we’ve got a’ appointment.”

“I don’ wanna see a doctor,” Levi says, frowning. He tears off the apple skin he was peeling and takes a couple quick bites, watching Kenny with his knife and apple still in hand.

“Too bad,” he says. “Let’s go.”

Levi doesn’t move. He narrows his eyes. “You feel funny,” he says. His magic is prickling at him – he’s getting a weird feeling from Kenny. He finishes eating the peeled apple skin and then takes a bite out of the apple itself, feet kicking where they hang over the table.

“Your ass is gonna feel funny after I finish beating it if you don’t get moving,” Kenny says.

Levi jumps down and slips his knife back into his pocket. He follows Kenny out the door.

“But why I gotta see a doctor?” Levi says as he hurries to keep up with Kenny. “I ain’t sick or hurt or nothin.”

“You are sick ya just don’t feel it,” Kenny says.

“What you talkin’ about?” Levi says.

“Just keep up,” Kenny says. “Stop asking so many damn questions.”

Levi follows him. They go into a part of the city they don’t usually go. It’s a long walk, long enough that Levi gets bored and a little tired. They finally reach a skinny house in a residential area that’s a little nicer than their neighborhood.

Kenny goes up to the door and knocks while Levi looks up at the building. He can feel people inside of it with his magic, only a few. A young man opens the door and lets them inside.

Levi looks around as they walk through the house, follows Kenny and the man up a flight of stairs.

As soon as they walk into the room a chill goes up Levi’s spine with a sharp sense of alarm. He has his knife in his hand automatically, taking a step back so he’s still in the entryway.

The feeling lingers and Levi grips his knife, eyes darting around the room, glancing behind him, trying to figure out what has his magic reacting so strongly.

“Levi, what a’ you doing?” Kenny says, one eyebrow raised, looking back at him.

The room looks normal – there’s only Kenny, the man who led them up there, and an older woman inside. Levi can feel the magic off her – she’s a witch. He can’t always tell, but witchery has the most distinct feeling of all the magics.

“Somethin’ wrong,” Levi says, frowning, glancing up at Kenny.

“Nothing’s wrong, get in here,” Kenny says.

Levi takes a hesitant step in. The man shuts the door behind him and Levi steps quickly over to Kenny, all but hiding behind him. Something _is_ wrong. He grips his knife tighter.

It takes him another couple moments to realize that the alarm and sense of danger is largely coming from the woman. Levi feels the prickly heat of magic pool in his palms and the soles of his feet.

“What are you hiding for, huh?” Kenny says, thumping him on the back again, stepping away.

“Somethin’ _wrong_ ,” Levi says again, quieter. He looks up at Kenny, but Kenny only lets out a huff.

“I told ya, nothin’s wrong,” Kenny says. “Now be a good brat and take yer shirt off so the doctor can see ya.”

Levi shakes his head. “Uh-uh.” He takes a step back from Kenny.

Kenny’s eyes narrow. “Kid, you do as your told now. I told ya, yer sick, and it needs to be taken care of.”

“’M not sick,” Levi says, scowling. “An I don’ wanna see no doctor. I wanna go home now.”

“Too bad,” Kenny says.

He makes to grab Levi’s arm, but Levi sidesteps, slashing with his knife. Kenny swears and just as Levi turns to run, Kenny gets a hold of his arm.

Levi might be much faster and deceptively stronger than most people, even most adults, because of how strong the Life part of his Chaos magic is, and how quickly it developed, but Kenny also has Chaos magic, and he easily grabs him and wrestles him over towards a bed on the other side of the room.

“Let go!” Levi yells. “Let go, Kenny!”

“Quit squirming, ya ungrateful brat,” Kenny says. The knife comes flying out of Levi’s hand, Kenny using his Earth magic to send the metal of the blade flying away. Sparks break out across Levi’s skin, but his Fire magic isn’t developed farther than that yet.

Levi’s shirt is wrested off of him and Kenny keeps a grip around one of his arms as Levi stills his struggling, glaring at Kenny.

“Fuck you, Kenny,” he says, giving his arm a hard tug. Kenny only squeezes his wrist, hard enough to hurt, in response. “Ow!”

“I told ya to quit your squirming,” Kenny says. “Now you listen. Yer gonna sit down on that bed, and you’re gonna be the perfect patient, got it?”

Levi scowls but when Kenny lets go of his arm he steps over to the bed and, still scowling murderously, sits down on the edge of it.

The woman approaches and pulls over a chair. Levi turns his attention to her suspiciously, watching as she opens up a case. Levi peers into it to see a metal cuff of some sort and several needles.

Levi remembers, suddenly, in hazy fragments, his mom holding him while he looked at a gleaming metal instrument, remembers feeling scared, and clutching at her, as a sharp pain broke out at the inside of his elbow. He remembers the face of a woman, and mama stroking his hair, and he remembers sudden, unbearable pain.

Levi backs up along the edge of the bed, eyes going wide. He looks from the woman and then to Kenny, his hands up.

“Wait,” he says, his voice trembling. “Wait, is it – whata you doing?”

“Your magic is sick, my dear,” the woman says. “I’m going to make it better.”

Levi shakes his head. “My magic’s fine,” he says, high-pitched. “Kenny,” he says, looking over at him.

Kenny’s got a grimace on his face and he’s got that funny, wrong feel to him again. When he takes a step towards the bed, Levi backs away from him too.

“It’s gonna hurt, in’it?” he says, looking from the woman to Kenny.

“Only for a minute, dear,” she says, and Levi can feel with his magic that she’s lying.

“You’re lying,” Levi says, backing up some more, heart thudding in his chest. He looks over at Kenny. “I wanna go home,” he says, “ _Kenny_.”

“Psh, don’t be a drama baby, I know yer tougher than that,” Kenny says. Levi can’t read Kenny’s emotions to tell if he’s lying because of Kenny’s magic, blocking him, but Levi’s still getting that funny feeling from him. He shakes his head.

“No, I wanna leave, I wanna go home, Kenny,” Levi says. The man from before starts walking towards the bed, and Levi backs up so that his back touches the wall.

“It’s not so bad,” Kenny says. “Come on, yer a big boy, go let the doctor lady see to you.”

“No,” Levi says, shaking his head.

When Levi tries to jump off the bed and run, Kenny grabs his arm, and then his other arm, and this time Levi struggles with everything he has, screaming, swearing, sparks shooting off him, ice crystals materializing along his skin. He bites the other man when he starts helping Kenny. They get him facedown on the bed and hold him still there and Levi starts to sob.

He sobs and starts begging and pleading for them to stop, to let him go, to not do this to him. The woman inserts a needle into his arm, and then puts the cuff on him, and it _hurts_. He’s terrified.

The pain comes sharp and crushing after that. He screams, mindless.

When he comes to afterwards, he’s crying and whimpering, exhausted, his whole body aching. Kenny carries him back, Levi curled up and shaking the whole time. When they get back Levi curls into a ball on the cot that is his bed.

He refuses to speak to Kenny for two days. He barely moves the whole time, still in pain. He refuses to eat the food and treats that Kenny brings him.

“It was for yer own good,” Kenny says, exasperated, the second day. “Listen, Levi, you’ve got corrupted magic. Do you know what that means? It means if you don’t go see that Witch, and get your magic fixed up, you turn into a goddamn demon.” Kenny mutters something. “Ungrateful brat.”

22 Spring

Underground, Outer East

They would not be able to do what they did without Hange. She was the most vital member of their team by all accounts. While he and Mike were crucial pieces, Erwin was not so arrogant as to think himself irreplaceable. They were only able to do what they did because of Hange, not only because she was a brilliant Witch and a genius, but because she was also the one who funded them.

After leaving the service of the king, it was her inheritance, services, and goods, which they lived off of. Erwin had very little money of his own, and Mike was the same. They each got a sort of stipend or allowance from Hange, even though it was Erwin’s idea to leave the service in the first place. Not that it took much convincing. Hange had been bored, stifled, and frustrated there. Mike found their work unchallenging and ineffective. And Erwin had simply gotten fed up with the bureaucracy and the limited work they were actually allowed to do.

So they started hunting demons on their own. They’d been doing it for five years now. Hunting demons and tracking down corruption mages was not technically illegal but they had certainly done a lot of illegal things in the process. None of them were officially wanted yet but they were very careful when visiting large cities with a high military police presence.

Despite their mission to hunt demons, most of their time is spent tracking down third tier witches – witches who can perform rituals. Specifically, summoning ones.

There are three types of demons – titans, corruptions, and devils. Devils are born in hell and either climb their way to earth or are summoned by witches, titans are created by witches through human sacrifice, and corruptions are people who had corrupted Chaos magic, and then turned into a demon from the corruption. Devils and titans are the most common. Corruptions are only formed from mages with corrupted Chaos magic, and Chaos magic itself is the rarest magic type, never mind corrupted Chaos magic.

Erwin has only come across a handful in his life, and they are terrifying. Hange has seen more. She specializes in corruption sealing rituals.

It’s a witch whose creating titans that brings them to the underground city. They’ve been trying to track him down for months while dealing with other, smaller problems, and finally get a hint that he’s headed for the underground below Sina.

After being in the underground for only a couple days, it becomes clear that the witch they’ve been tracking is not the only problem witch down there – though the others are summoning devils, not creating titans (titans are generally quite large, and would be massively destructive in the confined underground – they are more commonly summoned in mountain villages or as part of war efforts). Even after their trail goes cold, they decide to stay for a while to clear up the devil problem.

“There’s two of them,” Mike says, nodding down at the building that they’ve tracked the devils to.

They’re standing up on the roof of another building, both wearing the ODM gear that Hange created. It attracts a lot of attention, both because of the strange, bulky contraptions and the high density of rune and spell work covering it.

Erwin nods. Mike can smell them. He has extended senses as part of his Life magic, though his nose is better than all his other senses. Erwin can feel it too though – he feels it as a threat, a warning bell going off inside his head. Erwin has Psychic magic.

“Let’s move,” Erwin says.

They go in through opposite windows, Mike landing first. He’s a better fighter than Erwin, a testament to the Life magic that gives him enhanced strength, speed, reflexes, and agility.

Both devils go straight for him, shrieking when he enters. They’re black and grey colored creatures the size of bears, with gaping jaws and razor teeth, silver eyes. Erwin draws his blades the second they enter. They’re large to be using in the tight space, but they’re meant to be able to kill titans as well as devils, and runed with Hange’s magic for both. A normal blade can’t kill a demon.

Erwin kills one of them before it can even turn, lopping off its head. After a short struggle, Mike gets the other. In comparison to titans, they’re not overly difficult to kill. It’s only when they find a pack of them hiding together that things get tricky.

But Hange has explosives for that.

The bodies disintegrate as soon as the creatures die, and Mike and Erwin head out the way they came, going back to the rooftops. They’ll head back to their base where Hange is waiting. Hopefully she’ll be sleeping. The lack of sunlight has not done much for any of their sleeping schedules, but Hange’s was erratic to begin with. When Erwin went to sleep she was making potions, and when Erwin woke up she was still making potions.

As they swing from building to building with the ODM gear Hange and her friend Moblit created, Erwin notices someone else racing across rooftops, a ways ahead of them.

No. Two people. Erwin squints to see, but the couple intercepts their path about fifty meters in front of them. Air elementals – there’s no way they’d make the jumps otherwise. But even that – as Erwin watches he realizes he’s wrong again. There’s a man and a woman with red hair – or a boy and a girl, they look young, especially the girl – and it looks like only she has Air magic. The boy runs slightly ahead of her. Whenever there’s a large gap between buildings she uses a gust of wind to push him across as he leaps.

By the speed at which he races and the agility he has running across sometimes slanted rooftops, Erwin would guess that he has Life magic, but he’s too far away for his Psychic ability to pick it up one way or another.

Erwin frowns, and sees Mike looking over too, but they continue on their way back. That is, until a minute later when Erwin feels a spike of danger and the distinct nagging wrongness that indicates demonic presence.

He stops immediately, looking around, but the feeling is faint and he can’t quite tell where it’s coming from. Mike stops with him.

“Can you smell it?” Erwin says.

“Yes,” Mike says. He points ahead of them and slightly to their left.

“What is that?” Erwin says, frowning. There’s something strange about the feeling of the presence, almost like it’s flickering.

Mike takes a long breath in through his nose. His expression morphs. “It’s corruption,” he says. “Shit – I don’t think they’re fully turned.”

He takes off towards the disturbance and Erwin is right behind them. If it’s a mage with corrupted magic and they’re not fully turned yet, then Hange may be able to help them. Mages with corrupted magic will turn into corruption demons if they’re not treated by a Witch. The process of turning is accelerated by hurting and killing other humans, so it can take years for a mage to turn into a demon, or it can all happen at once in a rush of bloodlust.

They hear screaming as they approach.

As the scene comes into view, the first thing Erwin sees are the bodies, and his stomach sinks. There’s several of them – five, Erwin realizes – and there’s enough blood that even if they aren’t all dead, they’re all severely injured. The second thing he sees, to his surprise, are the Air elemental and the blonde man with her. And then he sees the Chaos corrupted mage.

_Shit,_ Erwin thinks. The kid looks like he’s only a teenager, maybe sixteen.

The blonde man has the Chaos mage in a headlock, pulled up against his body, standing. The girl has both her hands pressed to the sides of his face.

“Look at me, look at my eyes,” the girl says. “Levi, big bro, look at me.”

Erwin sees the Chaos mage’s eyes shining silver. _Shit._ That Air elemental and the man are in trouble – he’s in the middle of a bloodlust if not actually turning right in front of them. Erwin’s sure at least one of them is about to get hurt.

“Let me the fuck go,” he snarls, struggling against the other man’s hold, but Erwin is surprised again when no magic appears, when he doesn’t try to attack either of them.

_They’re close,_ Erwin thinks. His magic, even the corruption, has to recognize the two of them, and the bond has to be strong.

“Breathe,” the blonde man says. “Levi, breathe, relax, they’re dead.”

“Come back to us,” the girl says.

Erwin stops on the building, far enough away that they don’t notice them, at least not yet, but close enough that he can hear them. Mike stops next to him too. If they go down there, they risk inciting the Chaos mage’s bloodlust again, and it seems that the other two are getting the situation under control.

Sure enough, Erwin watches as the other two talk him down, until finally his hands drop from where they’ve been clawing at the blonde man’s grip, and the silver shine of corruption fades from his eyes.

He collapses a moment later. The blonde man eases him gently to the ground.

“Fuck,” Erwin hears him say.

The mage’s shoulders shake. After killing that many people, after succumbing to the bloodlust that far, he’s going to go into shock. He’s safe from turning fully or irreparably for the moment, but he’s just eaten a huge chunk out of whatever safeguards he has against the corruption – out of his own body if he has no safeguards.

Erwin’s only ever seen a Chaos corrupted mage go into post bloodlust shock a couple of times, but he knows from what Hange has told him what to expect. Different corrupted mages will react differently, sometimes even differently each time, but it’s usually accompanied by some strong emotion – anger or fear usually, but it can be anything, even excitement or happiness.

The girl takes his hands, and Erwin sees that they shake as well. The corrupted mage is on his knees now, head tilted down, the blond man with his hands on his shoulders behind him.

“Is,” the corrupted mage says. It comes out shaky.

“It’s okay,” she says, gently this time, the stern, hard tone she’d used before gone now.

He lets out a gasp and hunches. “Hurts,” he says.

Erwin decides that it’s time they step in. With a slide of metal he uses the ODM to grapple down to the ground, landing lightly a few meters away from them. Mike follows a second later.

All three of them look up. It only takes an instant for both the girl and the blonde man to draw knives, moving protectively in front of the corruption mage, who stays on the ground. He’s clearly not in any condition to fight, though if the range of bodies around him are any indication, he can fight just fine on his own when not incapacitated.

Erwin holds up his hands, showing that they’re empty. “Hello,” he says.

“The fuck you want?” the girl says. Her eyes slip over their ODM gear, the blonde man’s too.

“My name is Erwin Smith,” he says. He nods at Mike. “This is my friend Mike Zacharias. We don’t mean you or your friend any harm. We want to help.”

“Is that right,” the blonde man says.

This close, Erwin can tell that he does in fact have Life magic – though it feels pretty week – first tier, if Erwin would guess. So still the enhanced strength, speed, and agility but none of the more impressive Life magic skills, like Mike has. The girl is tier two Air.

The boy on the ground is a tier three Chaos corrupted mage and very powerful at that – even weakened, Erwin can feel how strong his magic is. Chaos magic itself is very, very rare – the rarest type of magic – to have it tier three and so strong – the boy has to be the strongest mage that Erwin has ever seen. He’s taken aback by it.

“We don’t want your help,” the girl says, waving her knife. “So you can back off.”

“We have a friend who’s a Witch,” Erwin says. “She can help your friend. She specializes in corrupted magic.”

The blonde man falters. He looks over at the girl, but her expression doesn’t change.

“We want to help,” Erwin says firmly. He takes a careful step forward.

Lightening fast, Mike’s blade is suddenly right in front of Erwin’s face, the flat of it parallel to him, and something careens off it, the flat of the blade blocking it from hitting Erwin in the face.

Behind the blade, Erwin sees the Chaos mage’s hand out, several rocks from the ground floating in the air in front of him. He has a murderous look on his face and his eyes glint silver for only a second.

Apparently, he is not that weakened after all.

The blonde man turns around and his voice is fast and hard. “ _Levi_ ,” he says. “So help me God if you kill another one right now – do you _want_ to turn?”

“Fuck off,” Levi says, and it’s not clear if he’s talking to the blonde man or to them.

“If you can use third tier Earth magic then you must be able to access your Psychic magic,” Erwin says to the boy. Chaos mages had all of the other seven magic disciplines – the four Elementals, Life, Psychic, and Witchery. And if he was third tier then he could certainly read emotions using Psychic magic. “We mean you no harm, we want to help,” Erwin says. “Use your empathy – I’m not lying.”

“Why would you help us,” the girl says. There’s clear suspicion rolling off her, but Erwin can feel the hesitation and worry in both her and the blonde man. The Chaos mage is hiding his emotions – Erwin can’t read anything from him.

“We’re demon hunters,” Erwin says. “If we can stop a corrupted mage from turning into a demon then that’s one less problem for us. We’ve done this before, our Witch friend knows how to perform sealing rituals and healing spells.”

Erwin can feel the press of the chaos mage’s mind – not overbearing, not trying to get in, but it’s there, reading him.

“Levi,” the blonde man says. “He lying, or what?”

Levi’s shoulders shake, and suddenly his eyes shut and he drops down, one hand coming to wrap around his side and the other bracing against the ground. His mental defenses falter and Erwin can feel the pain coming off him for a moment before they’re back and the boy looks up again.

“Levi,” the blonde man says again.

“No,” he says, “he’s not.”

“What will you want in return,” the blonde man says.

“Your help, maybe,” Erwin says. He knows the boy is still reading his emotions. There’s no use lying and saying they won’t want anything. No – to have a mage that powerful on their side – Erwin’s not willing to stand by and ask for nothing. If he can get this boy to help them – it would be an utter gamechanger.

“Gah!” the boy screams all at once, falling down onto a forearm, pain and a sharp stab of fear radiating off him. When he looks up it’s to look desperately at the blonde man, his eyes going silver again.

“Shit,” the blond man says. He glances back at Erwin and Mike but then moves over to the boy – Levi – and kneels next to him, placing one hand on his back.

“Please let us help,” Erwin says, watching as the boy grits his teeth, eyes squeezed shut.

“Fuck, I need – _fuck_ , Furlan,” the boy says, his mental magic suddenly gone, as if Mike and Erwin aren’t there anymore. 

“Breathe,” the blonde man says.

The girl glances worriedly behind her, back at her friends, but doesn’t move from where she holds out her knife, in front of them.

“No, no, just lemmee – there’s two more, I know there is, they’ve got another two guys in the house, I can feel them, just lemmee –”

“No,” the blonde man says firmly.

“It _hurts_ ,” the boy says, a snarl.

“I know, and you’re going to wait it out,” the man says. “You’re not hurting anyone else today.”

“Fuck you, it hurts, I need to,” he says.

“No you don’t, breathe.”

Erwin realizes with a sick twist of his stomach that he was wrong – the boy’s not going into post bloodlust shock, he’s going into sudden _withdrawals_.

Which means he’s closer to turning then Erwin thought.

Mike makes a noise next to him. He looks over at Erwin and they share a brief look.

“Please, your friend needs help,” Erwin says. “If he’s getting withdrawals, he’s dangerously close to turning. Our Witch can help heal the damage and seal the corruption so it doesn’t get any worse.”

The blonde man and the girl look at each other again. The girl is looking more worried now too. The man looks back at them with a set jaw.

“Okay,” he says, “okay, we’ll come with you.”

Levi’s in pain. Levi’s in pain and he can’t decide if he wants to kill someone or just fucking die already, because pain keeps exploding in his head and racking up his spine and shooting in his joints.

His vision blurs. He can’t think straight.

“ _Furlan_ ,” he says. He grabs at the front of Furlan’s shirt, and then yells as another burst of pain washes over him.

He’s in pain, he’s dying, he needs to kill. Fear and dread roll through him. He can’t concentrate. It feels like reality is sliding around him.

“Breathe,” Furlan says. “I’m right here. We’re gonna get you help.”

“I need,” he starts. His stomach rolls. He’s going to be sick.

“No you don’t,” Furlan said. “It’s gonna pass, you’re gonna be fine.”

There’s voices around him. Furlan’s hands shift, and suddenly Levi’s being pulled to his feet.

“Come on,” Furlan says.

“We’re getting you help, big bro,” Isabel says.

Levi hadn’t noticed her there. He looks blearily, blinks his eyes. No, no, there were two more – he’d seen Don and that rat-faced kid they all hung out with take off into the house – he’s sure they’re still there. He can kill them. He wants to kill them.

“Come on, up,” Furlan says.

Levi vaguely registers that they’re climbing into a carriage. This confuses him– he’s ridden in a carriage maybe once before in his life.

“What?” he says. Another wave of pain wracks through him.

The next thing Levi registers is the sight of a bed and Furlan putting him down onto it. Levi looks at a ceiling. Pain spikes prickles across his skin. He looks for Furlan and Isabel and finds them both at his side. Then Furlan’s hands move across his skin, unbuttoning his vest, then his shirt. Levi sees the ceiling again, then he’s pushed upwards, the clothes coming off. He’s rolled onto his stomach.

He turns his head to the side. Isabel is there. He feels something come down on his arm, and then someone takes the place of Isabel and Levi watches a metal cuff go around his wrist, and then be pressed down. He pulls at it and finds no give. That sets off a string of fear and he tries to get up, starts to struggle when he can’t.

“It’s going to hurt, he’ll lash out,” someone says. The words don’t register above the fear at being tied down.

“It’s okay, big bro,” Isabel says. He feels fingers in his hair, sees her take his hand.

His breathing is loud, erratic in his ears. Isabel moves and shifts, and then he sees Furlan too.

“Bite down,” Furlan says, and something is placed between his teeth. Levi bites.

Furlan replaces Isabel with holding his hand. Levi registers that. When he’s been in pain before, Furlan’s always the one who holds his hand. He can hurt Isabel with his strength, but Furlan’s magic counteracts it better.

It’s Levi’s last coherent thought before blinding pain tears through him.

When Levi wakes up he’s still hurting but it’s only aches now, none of the sharp, shooting pains from before, and he no longer feels the urge to hurt or kill. The cravings tend to pop up unpredictably and sporadically, almost always from a specific trigger – someone attacking him or pissing him off while acting aggressive usually.

This time it had been because Isabel came home hurt – a group of guys who had bothered her before had attacked her, nearly assaulted her, and Levi had seen red and gone out with the intention to kill. It was stupid and reckless and driven by the cravings, and he realizes now how terrible of an idea it was, but at the time it had felt perfectly justified.

“Levi-bro,” Isabel says, the moment he opens his eyes. A second later she’s hugging him and Levi gasps.

“Easy, Is,” Furlan says, and Isabel eases off.

Levi blinks, taking in the surroundings, tensing up a little bit until he notices how relaxed both Furlan and Isabel look, how there’s no one else in the room.

Isabel punches him in the shoulder – hard enough to hurt – and Levi flinches back. “Don’t you ever do something like that again!” she says.

Levi’s stomach sinks as it all comes rushing back. He looks over at Furlan and can’t help feeling guilty. Furlan’s looking at him with a hard expression.

“I know,” Levi says.

Furlan lets out a sigh. “This was a close one,” Furlan says.

Levi nods. He’d felt it – how the corruption kept eating away at his control even after he’d calmed down – how it had, instead of fading completing, suddenly ramped back up. He’s never felt that happen before.

He’s lucky. He knows that.

Right on cue, the door opens, and Levi tenses as the blonde Psychic from before, the one who had done the talking, and a woman enter. The woman grins at him.

“You’re awake!” she says. She claps her hands together. “This is so exciting!”

Levi looks sideways at Furlan and Isabel.

“This is my friend, Hange, the Witch,” Erwin says, gesturing at her. “I don’t know if you remember, but I’m Erwin.”

“I remember,” he says. Erwin Smith. He’d heard about a new trio that kept flying around on these weird contraptions but he’d yet to see it when they came dropping down.

“It’s nice to meet you, Levi,” he says, and gives him a small smile.

Levi tentatively reaches out with his magic. He’s weak – tired and drained – but he can still access it fine. He pulls up his usual mental defenses, the feeling automatic now.

“You need corruption healing,” the woman, Hange, says.

Levi looks at her, confused. He remembers vaguely that they’d done something to him – he’s assuming a sealing ritual – and he doesn’t know what she’s talking about. He frowns at her.

Erwin sighs. “To get right into it, what Hange has given you is only a temporary seal. You’re fine for right now, but you’re going to need to have the damage from the corruption healed and pushed back before she can give you a better seal.”

_Shit_ , Levi thinks. He’s really done it this time, apparently.

“Which is very exciting,” Hange says. “I almost never see someone as far along in the process as you, it’s such a great opportunity to look at end level processes.”

Erwin sighs again. “Hange,” he says.

“What? I’m just excited to work with our new patient here,” she says, before pulling out a notebook. “I just have some questions before I can draw up a treatment plan.”

“A _what?_ ” Levi says.

“Just hear what they have to say,” Furlan says.

“I need to know what I’m working with, and then I can figure out what spells and potions and rituals you’ll need,” Hange says. “First, how old are you?”

Levi doesn’t answer at first. He looks over at Furlan and Isabel, but they both nod at him. It’s not like either of them are overly trusting, and Levi trusts their judgment.

“Twenty-two,” Levi says, somewhat reluctantly.

Erwin looks at him in surprise and Levi glowers. He is used to people thinking he’s still a teenager. They usually think he’s the same age or younger than Isabel, when in reality he’s four years older. She’s eighteen, and Furlan is twenty-three.

“I saw the previous seals on your back,” Hange says. “How old were you when you got them?”

“Four, nine, sixteen,” he says.

He’d known he needed another one soon, but they were painful (to say the least) and he’d been putting it off. He hadn’t realized how much it had already degraded.

She pauses. “You waited seven years between sealings? And then another six now? No wonder you’re so close to turning. I’m surprised you haven’t already.”

Levi frowns at her, feels his skin prickle. He knew he waited too long the last time, but was it really that much longer than he should have? He hadn’t exactly ever been told a definitive timeline – he just knew that when the seal started breaking down he needed to go have it done again.

“Okay,” she says. “How many people have you killed?”

“Dunno,” he says. Almost automatically he pulls up more defenses around his mind, realizes belatedly that it doesn’t really matter – Erwin will be able to feel it off of Furlan and Isabel if not off of him.

“Give me a range,” she says. “Five, fifteen, fifty?”

She says it without judgement, which is surprising. Levi really doesn’t know the exact number. He’s never kept count – it feels too much like considering the kills a trophy, and despite the cravings and the bloodlust, Levi isn’t proud of the number of people he’s killed. He doesn’t feel much guilt for it – he’s never killed someone who’s innocent, usually only kills when someone has attacked him first – but he doesn’t feel any pride over it either.

He doesn’t say anything, and Furlan elbows him. Levi turns to glare. “Just tell them,” he says. “You could be a demon right now if it weren’t for their help, just tell them.”

Levi scowls, but he turns back to Hange. “Round thirty, maybe thirty-five.” _Probably thirty-five_.

If she’s surprised, she makes no sign of it. Levi can’t get a read off her besides a vague sense of excitement and energy. She has to have a cloaking charm on her.

She asks more questions – who put the seals on him before, the answer being a Witch whom his mother and Kenny had known – an ancient woman who he only knows by the name of Gem. He’s not even sure she’s still alive, had been thinking he might have to track down a different witch when he got it sealed again. She asks about killings in the last few years, about how often the cravings strike him, who he normally kills, if he’s ever hurt someone he hasn’t meant to.

The cravings have been happening more often, strong ones maybe once a month, weaker ones two or three times a weak. He’s never hurt someone he hadn’t meant to, but he’d killed people when he’s only intended to hurt them, either suddenly overcome by the bloodlust or unconsciously giving in to it, striking just a bit harder than necessary, the blade moving over a couple inches seemingly on it’s own, and then suddenly Levi finds himself with a body instead of a screaming victim.

“Have you ever hunted people down?” Hange says. “Gone after people with the sole purpose of killing them to satisfy a craving?”

Levi purses his lips. Furlan glares at him. Levi used to take hit jobs every once in a while, until one of them ended in a fit of bloodlust and six people killed instead of one. Since then he’s taken a couple more hit jobs anyway, but he’s not told Furlan and Isabel about them prior.

“I was a hitman,” he says in answer.

“What about not for a job?” she says.

Levi grits his teeth, contemplates lying. “Once or twice,” he says. “People I know of though, shit people,” he says, “I’m not going around stalking kids or random people or nothing.”

He can feel the irritation off of Furlan, even if there’s no surprise, and Levi avoids looking over at him.

It is one of the only things he ever lies to Furlan and Isabel about – how much he kills, how often, if a kill was an accident or on purpose. Isabel worries and Furlan gets angry that Levi doesn’t take more care not to put himself in situations where he’ll get bad cravings alone, without Furlan or Isabel to help calm him down.

Furlan had been on him about getting it resealed too. Levi had brushed him off. He hadn’t wanted to do it and he hadn’t wanted to admit how much he hated the rituals, how painful they were, how much he was afraid of them. He can still remember his mother holding him down, a strange woman putting her hand on his back, and then agonizing pain that stuck around for days afterwards, his mother holding him, rocking him as he cried and clutched at her. With Kenny when he was nine, he had screamed and sobbed, struggled and tried to get away once he realized what was happening. He didn’t want to even think about the last sealing, when he was sixteen.

He’d at least passed out quickly this time. Of course the knowledge that he was going to have to do it again, along with whatever this healing would involve, sat heavy in his stomach.

So no, he really shouldn’t have gone after the guys who had bothered Isabel. At least, not alone, and not armed with knives, not when a fit of craving washed over him.

Hange finishes asking him questions and then performs a couple of tests with some amulets. Afterwards she explains that for now he’s going to need some serious work to push back the corruption. It’s going to mean spell work, runes, and rituals. Levi’s stomach sinks the more she talks.

“How long is this going to take?” Levi says.

“That really depends on you and how much your body can tolerate,” she says. “At it’s fastest, a couple weeks, at it’s slowest, maybe six months.”

Levi’s frown deepens. “I want it done as quickly as possible. How often do I need to come in?”

“If you really want to get it done as fast as possible then it’ll be best for you to just stay here,” she says. “At the most, we could do three sessions a day.”

Levi feels his chest tighten. He swallows. “Okay.”

“We’ll start with twice a day and see how you handle that,” she says.

Furlan leaves long enough to get some stuff from their place that they’ll need. Isabel falls asleep in the bed next to Levi’s in their infirmary, and Furlan slumps to sleep in a chair. Erwin makes a mental note to find a cot for him. Erwin’s pretty certain neither of them are leaving anytime soon.

The next morning Erwin brings them some food, and an hour later Hange arrives. She starts taking things out and putting them on the table next to Levi’s bed. She gives him something to drink first – something to dull the pain. He drinks it and then watches her prepare.

When Hange pulls out the rune cuff Levi looks sharply away, tensing all up. He glances back again a moment later, stiff, jaw clenched.

“You need a rune cuff?” he says.

Hange makes a sympathetic noise. “It’s the easiest way to get my magic infused in your blood.”

“Is there a way to do that without it?” Levi says.

Erwin’s eyes flick from Levi to Furlan and Isabel. Isabel’s grimacing and Furlan has a forced neutral expression on his face.

“Afraid not,” Hange says, oblivious to the tension she’s causing.

Furlan takes Levi’s hand, and Levi turns to him. They exchange a glance, and Furlan nods at him. Erwin sees Furlan’s hand tighten, squeezing once. Levi’s face goes pale.

The kid must really not like rune cuffs. It’s not surprising. They’re painful and usually involved in equally painful procedures. He’s probably had them on during the other sealing rituals.

Hange waits with the open rune cuff on the table, a sterile needle in her hand. Levi looks back over. His jaw tightens and he hesitates before shifting his arm over.

_Hange,_ Erwin thinks, using his telepathy.

She glances up at him. Erwin makes a subtle nod at Levi.

Hange straightens and then her eyes refocus, suddenly paying attention to him rather than to her supplies. She tends to get caught up in her work very easily, but she’s perceptive when she’s paying attention. She pauses as soon as she takes in his tense body language.

“Actually, let me give you another potion first,” she says.

Levi relaxes marginally, and then watches as Hange rummages through a cabinet filled with bottles. She takes out what Erwin knows is something that will take some of the anxiety away.

“Drink this,” she says, handing it to him. “It’ll help you stay relaxed during the procedure. It might make you a little sleepy.”

Levi eyes the mixture the same way he eyed the painkilling potion, but he drinks it. It only takes a few moments to take effect and Levi relaxes a bit more.

“Okay, time for the prick,” Hange says, taking his arm.

Levi stares at the needle right up until Hange brings it to his arm, and it’s like he can’t force himself to do it anymore. He looks over at Furlan and Isabel instead, giving them a queasy look.

Furlan nods again. Levi winces and jolts when Hange inserts the needle. He closes his eyes and tenses as she attaches the rune cuff afterwards, lets out a cut off noise of pain when she closes it.

“All done,” she says. “Now just lie back.”

Levi does. Erwin watches Hange. She closes her eyes and clasps her hands together. She has a ring which helps her focus her magic. The rune cuff will help that magic attach to Levi. She starts mumbling spells under her breath.

As she keeps going, Levi’s mental defenses fall away. He starts sweating, and then closes his eyes. Erwin can feel the pain coming off him, and with it a growing fear. He starts fidgeting, shifting. Furlan holds his hand and Isabel keeps a hand on his shoulder, rubbing back and forth.

About ten minutes in he turns his head back towards Furlan and Isabel and opens his eyes, the look on his face desperate, pained.

“It’s alright,” Furlan says quietly, almost too quietly for Erwin to hear. “It’s almost over.”

A minute later he moves suddenly, clutching at his chest, a noise coming up his throat. It breaks off in a groan, and he moves restlessly, clawing at the skin of his chest. He’s not wearing a shirt, and his skin goes red from the scratches his nails make.

“Easy, big bro,” Isabel says, and she takes his hand by the wrist, pulling it away from his chest.

“It hurts,” Levi says, his voice rough, low. He tugs at his hand, but Isabel keeps it in hers. “Fuck,” Levi says, turning his head sharply to the side, eyes squeezing shut. Erwin sees sweat beading up on his forehead, wetting his hair. “Ah-ah,” Levi says, before gritting his teeth.

“You can yell,” Furlan says. “If it hurts, you can yell, Lee.”

Erwin feels a prickling discomfort, like he’s interfering with something intimate. He’d come just in case Levi lashed out during the procedure, because once Hange started she really couldn’t stop until it was finished, but now he thinks maybe it was a bad idea, that his presence is probably not helping the ordeal.

“It’s getting worse,” Levi says. “Shit, _shit_.” His eyes squeeze shut tighter and he starts shaking. “ _Hurts_. It hurts.”

“It’ll be done soon,” Isabel says. “It’s all right big bro, it’ll be done in a minute.”

“Fuck, please,” Levi says.

It goes on for another couple minutes, and then Levi relaxes all at once, a few seconds before Hange opens her eyes.

She looks immediately at Erwin, and she’s frowning, a focused look on her face. Erwin’s stomach sinks.

“All done,” she says to the other three, turning towards them. “Rest now, Levi. Sleep if you can.” She’s moving towards the door a moment later, giving Erwin a pointed look.

“We’ll be back with lunch later,” Erwin says to them. “If you need anything we’ll probably be in the study, feel free to come find us.”

He exits with Hange. She turns around as soon as the door is shut and they’re in the hallway.

“It’s worse than I thought,” she says grimly.

As soon as Hange and Smith leave, Levi feels as if he collapses.

“Fuck,” he says, voice shaky. He’s still trembling all over. He’s exhausted and he aches everywhere. “ _Fuck_.”

“It’s over,” Furlan says.

“I have to do that again tonight,” Levi says. His voice is hoarse. He feels like shit already. He’s going to have to do this everyday for the next two weeks at least. His stomach tightens to a ball. “ _Fuck_ ,” he says again.

He regrets going after the men who bothered Isabel. He regrets not getting it resealed sooner. He regrets waiting so long to seal it when he was sixteen. He regrets all of it with every aching ounce of his body.

“The Witch lady said you can do it less if you needa,” Isabel says, frowning.

“Yeah, you can do it once a day instead if it’s too much,” Furlan says.

Levi shakes his head. “I want it done. I don’t wanna have to keep doing this.”

He doesn’t. He really, really doesn’t want to be doing this for weeks, months, even if it’s less often. He doesn’t think he could stand it.

“Is it as bad as the sealing?” Isabel asks.

She wasn’t there for the one when he was sixteen. They didn’t know her yet. Furlan had gone with him though.

“No,” Levi says. He feels hollow. The word comes out resigned. “But it fucking hurts anyway.”

It really hurt. It had felt like something was being seared into his chest. It still hurts. He rubs at it unconsciously.

Levi falls asleep. He’s surprised by it when he wakes up to Smith and Hange coming back in with plates of food. He normally doesn’t sleep much, but either the spells exhausted him or it was that potion Hange gave him.

Smith and the Witch are both frowning when they enter though, and Levi feels like he might cry when he feels the tense regret coming off the both of them. He tenses up and waits.

They give them their food, and Levi barely looks at it. He knows they have something to say and he knows it’s nothing good – he can feel it off them.

Erwin starts. “We have some bad news,” he says.

“No shit,” Levi snaps. He can’t help it. He can still feel the dregs of pain and he’s growing anxious.

“The corruption is farther along than I thought,” Hange says.

“Okay,” Levi says. “What does that mean?”

“It means I can’t seal it,” Hange says.

Levi looks at her. He looks at her and feels his body run cold. “What?” he says after a long moment.

“Think of your magical body as a circle,” Hange says. “When you were born, the corruption started as this little pinprick in the very center. By the time it manifested enough for anyone to realize you had the corruption, it was a small dot. Then you got your first seal. That seal was placed around the dot, a ring around it, well within the circle of your magical body. Then the dot grew, and it started eating at the seal. So you had another one put on – another ring around the corruption, this time a little bit farther out. Then you waited seven years between sealings. That let the corruption eat through your previous seal completely, and spread farther, so it’s no longer a little black dot, but a large black splotch. You had it sealed, that put another ring around the corruption, but this time it was right on the outside rim of the circle of your magical body.

“So your last seal was made on top of the outer layer of your magical body,” she continues, “and the corruption has eaten into that seal as well. I knew that already. The goal of these rituals is to push back the corruption, to make it smaller, to give enough room to make another seal. I hadn’t realized before, but the corruption hasn’t only eaten into your previous seal, it’s eaten into the outer ring of your magical body as well. Even after I push back the corruption, I won’t be able to place another seal, because the outer ring of your magical body is no longer intact.”

Levi swallows. He doesn’t know what to say, just keeps staring at her.

“So what do we do now?” Isabel says in a burst, worry and impatience lacing her voice.

“I can keep placing temporary seals,” she says. “They won’t last very long – a few months, but they’re not strong like the other seals. You could kill two people, maybe three, and that will break them completely. You’ll have to be more careful, and you’ll need to have them strengthened or replaced every time you kill someone.

“I still need to push back the corruption,” she says, “but unless you plan on sticking around us, you’ll need to find another witch at some point who knows how to do temporary seals and the rituals to push back corruption. I’m assuming whoever you went to before doesn’t, because otherwise they would have seen how close you’d gotten to your outer layer on the last seal and pushed back the corruption before.”

Levi’s eyes have dropped and he stares at the blankets over his legs. “I’m going to have to get it sealed every couple months. For the rest of my life,” he says.

The room is silent.

“Yes,” Hange says finally.

There’s another beat of silence. “Fuck,” Levi says. He puts his head in his hands suddenly, feels his shoulders shake. “ _Fuck_.”

He feels a hand on his back start rubbing circles but he keeps shaking. _I’m so fucked,_ he thinks. _I’m so, so fucked._

“How many times have you killed multiple people in a bloodlust?” Erwin says. “Like this time?”

“I don’t know,” Levi says. He can’t think. “A few?”

He can stop himself if the fight ends, if it’s a hit or someone tries to jump him. But if there are multiple people – if he kills one person and then there are others who keep attacking him – he can’t control himself. If he’s still fighting after killing one person then he’ll keep killing until there’s no one left or the others run.

“The Madox brothers,” Furlan says, “The turf war with the Red Eyes. Chapel road. The job at the docks. When you got jumped on Westend.” He pauses. “I missing anything?”

“Spring festival,” Isabel puts in.

“That wasn’t my fault,” Levi mumbles.

“That’s… not good,” Hange says. “You’ll need to be much more careful. If you kill more than two people before getting it resealed you could turn. If you kill more than three you definitely will.”

“Fuck,” Levi says. He runs his fingers through his hair, staring down at the blankets. “That’s – fuck, I don’t know… I mean we live in the fucking underground, I’ve gotten jumped, we’ve had people come after us, half the gangs in this city want me dead, I can’t just… avoid violence or some shit.”

“You’re a third tier Chaos mage,” Erwin says, “and the most powerful one I’ve ever met at that. I’m sure you can incapacitate people without killing them.”

Levi looks up with a flash of irritation. “You try not killing people when it’s four on one and all your magic wants is to off them.”

“It will take some training,” Erwin says, “we can help you with that.”

_How the hell are you going to do that?_ Levi thinks. He supposes they could go for a walk in Red Eyes’ neighborhood and wait for someone to pick a fight, and then Levi can try not to kill anyone.

He’s really not that confident he’ll be able to stop himself. And if he kills someone, he’ll have to have it resealed.

_Fuck, fuck, fuck_.


	2. Seven Days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Levi continues with the rituals. There are some problems.
> 
> Also, you get to see how Levi broke the last seal. If you haven't reviewed the tags now would be a good time. I don't actually think the violence in this is that graphic, but there is blood and fighting and death etc, so please keep that in mind as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I added locations to the section headers. This is also not necessary to read, but for reference:
> 
> Inner East - east side of the inner ring of the Underground, most densely populated section, where Levi lived with Kenny  
> Outer East - east side of the outer ring of the Underground, where Erwin, Hange, and Mike are living  
> Westend - most affluent area, docks located there (docks are to an underground lake with a river leading above ground)
> 
> There will be more, but they haven't shown up yet.
> 
> Also for reference - I'm considering "Winter" to begin AFTER Levi's birthday. So chronologically, it would go 21 Summer, 21 Fall, 22 Winter, 22 Spring, etc

22 Spring

Underground, Outer East

For the next three days, Hange performs the rituals twice a day. Once first thing in the morning and once before dinner. Hange says Levi’s body and his magic are tolerating the rituals well, but Erwin’s not so sure that _Levi_ is tolerating it well.

He clearly dreads them, grows short tempered and snappish and anxious before them. He barely leaves the little infirmary room they have set up for them, despite Erwin and Hange’s insistence that they are welcome anywhere in their base, which is fairly large – it’s a temporary set up while they are in the Underground, a large house that they are renting, large enough for Hange’s lab and all her supplies and for them to spread out. Furlan and Isabel manage to persuade Levi into spending short bursts of time in the study or the sitting room – they go out to the market once – but Levi’s clearly in pain and exhausted. Erwin knows that the rituals are taxing in more ways than one, that they leave residual aches and pains as well.

And on the third day, Levi more or less demands that Hange increase the frequency to three times a day. Erwin thinks that this is a terrible idea.

“We can,” Hange says, when Levi brings it up again, though she sounds a bit reluctant as well. He’s been asking about it every day, but Hange had told him they needed to try twice a day for three days first, then they could revisit the topic. “Your magic is bouncing back quickly enough, and your body is recovering remarkably fast, but are you sure you want to have to do three a day?”

“Yes,” Levi says flatly.

“How is the pain?” Erwin says. “Between rituals I mean?”

“Fine,” Levi says.

“Is it fading completely between rituals, or is it steady the entire time?” Hange says.

“It’s manageable,” Levi says.

Hange looks at Erwin and then shrugs. “It’s up to you,” she says to Levi, “but if you can’t tolerate it then we will need to go back down to twice a day. And that includes if you aren’t getting enough sleep or you aren’t eating enough.”

Levi scowls at her. It’s already been a point of contention – Levi’s lost weight even the past three days, and he insists that he’s sleeping much more than normal (a fact which Furlan and Isabel have backed him up on), but it’s not nearly enough while his body is enduring and recovering from multiple rituals a day, according to Hange. 

“Let’s try it then,” Furlan says. He glances back at Levi and his head dips in just a slight nod. It’s an odd gesture, and makes Erwin wonder if Levi is speaking to him telepathically. Furlan looks back at them. “Better to just get it done with if we can.”

He does have a point. The less often Levi has the rituals the longer the whole thing has to drag out for. Erwin can understand wanting to just get it over with, to take more suffering for a shorter period of time, rather than the opposite.

It only takes two days of doing the rituals three times a day for Erwin to conclude that this is not sustainable.

It doesn’t give Levi enough time to recover, physically or mentally. The difference is clear, even more so to Erwin because Levi starts losing control of his magic, his defenses slipping, and Erwin catches more and more bits of pain and fear coming off him, seeping around the barricades of psychic magic. He’s exhausted and barely eats. When Hange brings him dinner that second day, and tells him that if he doesn’t finish the soup they are going back to twice a day, Levi forces it all down only to vomit five minutes later.

Erwin and Hange wait in the hall while Levi retches into the toilet off his infirmary room, Furlan and Isabel still in there with him. Erwin leaves to make tea, and comes back with a tray of cups. He finds them all back inside the room, Levi pale and glaring down at the sheets over his legs.

“I brought tea,” Erwin says. _Unhelpful_ , he thinks. But Levi takes the cup from him and Erwin passes the rest out too.

“Levi, I think we should go back to twice a day,” Hange says steadily.

“No,” Levi says.

“Lee –” Furlan starts.

“ _No_ ,” Levi says.

“Three is a lot,” Hange says. “It’s the absolute max.”

“Two is still a lot,” Erwin says, “it’s still going very fast –”

“ – Much faster than normal, really,” Hange says.

“ – So there’s nothing wrong with doing twice, or even less often,” Erwin says.

“I want to do three,” Levi says, teeth gritted.

“In my professional opinion –” Hange starts.

“You said two weeks – I want it fucking over with, you said if I do it the fastest it will be over within two weeks,” Levi says.

The room goes quiet. Isabel reaches out and Erwin is surprised when Levi grasps her hand tightly.

“You might just not be able to do that, Levi,” Hange says.

Levi grits his teeth. “I _can_.”

“It’s not just a question of will power,” Erwin says. “You need to give yourself time to heal. There’s a reason the rituals are painful. When Hange pushes back the corruption, she is burning out bits of your magic, bits that have been taken over by the corruption, and that damages your physical body too.”

“I am literally cauterizing infected tissue,” Hange says, then pauses. “Well, okay, not literally, but it’s a very good analogy.”

“I can handle it,” Levi says. He has a murderous look on his face, hands clenched. Levi’s eyes narrow even more, his expression intensifying, and Erwin feels an unsettling, involuntary spike of fear, a product of both his psychic magic and just his own reaction to the way Levi’s looking at him, suddenly very close to how a predator looks at its prey, just as Furlan snaps his fingers in front of Levi’s face.

“Hey,” Furlan says. When Levi doesn’t flinch, keeps glaring at Erwin, Furlan presses on his shoulder roughly, voice going harder “Levi, hey, relax, look at me.”

Levi growls, but then he breaks eye contact to look down, pressing the heels of his hands into his forehead. He lets out a groan. “Fuck.”

“Easy,” Furlan says, hand sliding from Levi’s shoulder to rub his back instead, voice soft again. Levi shivers.

There’s a long moment of quiet, the only sound the soft rustle of fabric from Furlan’s hand over Levi’s shirt, and then Hange bursts.

“Was that a normal craving, did you want to hurt us or was it really a murder urge? How close were you to attacking? Did it feel stronger or weaker than usual? Was –”

“I’m gonna fucking kill you anyway if you don’t shut up,” Levi says, still pressing his hands against his forehead. But then he lets out a stuttering breath, almost flinching.

“Really, does it feel different? This is important,” Hange says.

Hange says nearly everything is important when she’s excited about something, so Erwin’s not sure how true that statement is, but it does seem like it would be beneficial to know.

“It hurts more,” Levi says. “They don’t normally hurt like this.”

“Where and how much?” Hange says, at least managing to dial back her enthusiasm a bit this time, Erwin thinks.

“Everywhere. Aches. Head’s worst.”

“Let me grab the rune cuff, I’ll take a look,” Hange says.

“No, fuck that,” Levi says. “It’s not time yet.”

They’d been waiting until a bit later at night to do the third ritual, to try to space them out more.

“I just want to see –”

“Hange, let him have a break. You can look when you go to do the ritual,” Erwin says.

She pouts at him, but then glances back at Levi. “Fine, later then,” she says, “since you insist on having a third ritual against your doctor’s wishes.” 

Seven days. This is what Levi tells himself. Seven days left. The halfway point. Two weeks, Hange had said, and it’s been seven already, seven left now. He can do this for seven more days.

(Twenty-one more rituals. He tries not to think about that number.)

It’s the middle of the night when Levi wakes up to a burning sensation across his chest. He lets out a groan before he can stop himself, shifting. The room is dark, shades drawn, and quiet. It’s night time, or at least, night time for them, Furlan and Isabel asleep on the cots next to his bed.

Levi shifts and then gasps at the tight, burning pressure around his lungs. He keeps gasping for a few seconds, surprised by the sudden pain. It feels like he’s broken a rib, the pain spiking with every inhale.

Levi closes his eyes, grits his teeth against the pain just as he hears shifting, blankets moving. A moment later he feels a hand on his arm.

Levi’s breathing goes shallower. His chest tightens some more. It hurts. He’s so tired of pain. It’s always constant now – it’s obviously worst when he’s actually going through the rituals, but the pain lingers afterwards. It’s grating at him more and more, the longer it goes on. His chest is hurting especially now though, sharper than it should be. He turns his head to the side, can’t help it when another groan slips between his teeth.

He feels the hand on his arm move up, then push through his hair, gentle, soothing. “Is,” he says.

“’M right here, big bro,” Isabel says.

Levi tries to relax. The pain slowly gets worse. He can’t tell at first if it’s really intensifying or if it’s just in his head. He’s so sick of it all, sick of being in pain, just wants the whole nightmare to be over. But it gets worse until he can’t ignore it, until his breathing gets shallower, until he realizes with a jolt that the pain is sharp, that it’s intense, that it hurts much more than it should, than it ever has in the past seven days in between rituals.

“Is,” Levi says again. A coiling panic starts waking up as it gets harder to breathe, as the pain grows sharper and the pressure on his chest grows more constricting. “I need – I need you to get Hange.”

“Fur – Furlan, wake up,” Isabel says only a beat later, the hand gone from Levi’s hair. And he hears the door open and shut again, a loud bang, and then Furlan hovering over him.

“Lee,” he says, voice rough from sleep. “Hey, what’s wrong? What’s happened?”

_Can’t breathe, hurts_ , Levi says, using his telepathy as he tries to take deeper breaths. Furlan takes his hand and he squeezes.

_What happened?_ Furlan says.

_I dunno, it hurts, can’t breathe_ , Levi says.

Levi squirms, breath stuttering. He can’t take a deep breath – it hurts too much when he tries.

The door opens and Levi feels with his magic Hange and Isabel rush in, Erwin a few steps behind them, though Levi keeps his eyes closed.

“Erwin, top right cabinet, the amber potion in the tall glass,” Hange says. There’s some banging and Levi squeezes down on Furlan’s hand some more. Hange takes his other arm, and Levi just squeezes his eyes shut tighter when he feels her manipulate his arm so the inside of his elbow is facing up. He knows before it touches his skin that she’s going to insert a needle.

He feels dizzy, his magic spinning too, chest tight. He feels the metal of the rune cuff touch his skin just a second before the pain of it closing. He opens his mouth and no sound comes out.

_It’s okay, she’s gonna help, it’s okay_ , Furlan says, and Levi realizes that he screamed over the telepathic link even if no sounds came out of his mouth.

“I can’t see anything, we need the cuffs,” Hange says. “Erwin where’s the damn – oh, thank you, Levi, sit up, drink this.”

Levi is pushed upwards, liquid pressed to his mouth. He drinks. A drop slides down from the corner of his face, wet and sticky. It tastes like shit – the same potion Hange always gives him before the rituals – _fuck, is this going to be a ritual?_ Levi thinks with a jolt.

Metal touches his wrist, a burning, tingling zap of magic with it the second it touches his skin and Levi jerks his hand away only for someone to grab his wrist – he looks up. Isabel holds his wrist in one hand and cuffs that will block his magic in the other.

He remembers, sixteen years old, Furlan holding his hands while he started to cry, whole body shaking, the Witch putting the cuffs around his wrists.

“No,” he says, panic flooding in. He pulls his wrist back only for Furlan to grab it too, force it forward. “ _No_ ,” Levi says again.

“Easy, Levi, easy,” Furlan says.

“Stop,” Levi says. He can’t breathe. “Stop – _stop_ , fuck –”

“Levi, your magic is reacting against mine, I need to block it so that I can see what’s wrong,” Hange says.

Isabel snaps the first cuff onto his wrist and Levi feels his connection to his magic abruptly cut out. It’s a terrifying feeling and Levi struggles, almost flailing as Furlan pulls one of his hands down and Isabel pulls the other.

“Easy, Levi, breathe, just try to brea-” Furlan says.

“Ca-can’t,” Levi gets out, gasping.

A burning sensation starts up in his chest, a similar feeling to the corruption rituals Hange has been performing on him. He tenses up at the pain, lets out a short cry.

“Erwin, my bag,” Hange says.

The burning increases to a pressure. His magic is starting to react against it. It doesn’t just hurt now – it feels _awful_. Raw and uncomfortable, like a presence that shouldn’t be there, a wrongness that makes him squirm, makes him start to panic again.

Levi tries to reach out with his telepathy, to say it hurts, he can’t breathe, he needs a break, but he can’t access his magic and he opens his mouth to speak but can only gasp. He starts shaking.

“Okay, okay, you’re fine,” Furlan says, but his voice sounds anxious. A sound comes out between Levi’s teeth. The burning sensation gets _hot_ – uncomfortably and then painfully so. Sweat breaks out on his skin. He tries to pull his arm away – from what, he’s not even sure. He feels so lightheaded, feels like he’s suffocating – the heat makes it even harder to breathe.

“Erwin, brace him.”

Levi opens his eyes to see Erwin move forward and press his hands to Levi’s shoulders, bearing down. Levi’s eyes widen just as Hange reaches and presses something to his chest.

Levi arches, screams. It feels like ice is pressed to his chest – ice so cold it burns. He tries to move away and can’t, tries to talk and can’t, tries to breathe and _can’t_. It’s too much and he feels tears burning in his eyes. He fights against the hands holding him down for another minute, maybe less, but it hurts worse when he moves, the jarring cold sending knives into his skin with every jolt, and he finally stills, shaking, and turns his head to the side with his eyes squeezed shut only for tears to roll down his face. A pathetic noise comes up his throat.

“Easy, that’s good, it’s okay,” Furlan says.

Levi cries, squirms from the pain and the cold point of pressure over his chest almost involuntarily, body spasming. Fingers wipe over his forehead, card through his hair. When Levi opens his eyes, everything is spotty and spinning so he closes them again.

“Almost done, Levi.”

“You’re doing great, Lee, just a little more.”

“It’s okay, big bro.”

“You’re okay, it’s gonna be okay.”

The voices blur together. Tears drip down the sides of Levi’s face. He’s turned towards Furlan, away from Hange and the burning ice pressed to his skin. The pain softens slowly, the pressure easing slowly, the cold getting less intense – it all fades very slowly to nothing, and finally Levi’s breath evens out and his body relaxes and the ringing in his ears disappears.

He doesn’t move when Hange removes the item (the amulet?) she had pressed to his chest. The cuff is unlocked from around his wrist, his magic surging back. When Hange unclicks the rune cuff he winces. When she removes the needle, he shuts his eyes tighter.

“Levi, can you drink some water?” Hange says.

Levi doesn’t even want to move. He feels like he’s going to vomit. He’s still shaking. He wants to ask what the hell happened, but he thinks he just wants them to fucking leave more.

“Come on, Lee, a few sips,” Furlan says.

His throat is dry. Levi commits to turning his head, letting Furlan help him lean up the couple inches it takes for Hange to tilt a cup against his mouth. As soon as he starts drinking he finds he is thirsty – very much so. He drinks the rest of the cup.

“You can rest now,” Hange says. “The last ritual damaged your lungs, but it should be all fixed now. I’ll check you over for any other damage as well, but it can wait until the morning.”

“Thank you,” Furlan says.

Levi hears the door open, hears footsteps, hears it close again. Isabel shifts at his side and then his bed dips. She settles on the bed next to him, and then her arm comes over his chest and her head down against his shoulder and she hugs him, almost holding him.

Furlan still holds his hand. Levi chokes out a sob.

“It’s all over, it’s all done,” Isabel says, quietly, almost rambled. “All over.”

Furlan cards his fingers through Levi’s hair. Levi can’t stop trembling.

“It was scary and it hurt but it’s all over,” Isabel says. “All over now.”

Isabel keeps mumbling, repeating the same lines over and over, and Levi can never quite tell if it’s to calm him down or to calm herself – both, he thinks. Furlan keeps holding his hand. Levi keeps trembling, and every time he thinks he’s stopped crying another tear slides down his face. He doesn’t try to stop it – has no energy to. He falls asleep like that, with Isabel dozing on top of him and Furlan squeezing his hand.

21 Late Autumn

Underground, Docks in Westend

They’ve only had to ever really fight Levi once, but it’s not an experience either Furlan or Isabel wants to repeat.

The bloodlust hits him fast and hard the second Levi’s feet hit the deck of the boat. He knows the moment he feels it that he needs to turn back, that it’s a bad one – he needs to call out to Furlan and Isabel and get his ass out of there, the job be damned. But he doesn’t do that, because two seconds after he jumps into the boat, a man comes walking around the corner, and Levi sees his shocked face and the arm reaching for a gun or a knife and suddenly Levi has his own knife to the man’s throat, slicing across, sidestepping around his body so the blood doesn’t hit him.

The euphoric thrill hits him only a split second after, a full body sensation, warmth and a pleasant, aching adrenaline along with a high that has everything going sharply focused and heady at the same time.

Despite the fact that Levi can fight and kill in many, many ways with his magic, he has since childhood retained a penchant for knives. When Isabel and Furlan asked him why once – why he carries knives when he has such strong magic, he’d told them that it was often easier and much less taxing to fight with a knife than to expend large amounts of magic. Unless he was fighting with another powerful mage, a knife was generally sufficient. There was no need to set someone on fire, or manifest some kind of weapon with his Life magic, or shoot ice or rocks at them.

This is all true, but Levi knows that there is also a part of him that simply enjoys killing with knives much more than with his magic.

When the second man comes running out from below deck, Levi doesn’t hesitate, surges forward with a knife to his gut, then reaches up and takes the man’s head in his hands, before breaking his neck.

Another surging high – even better this time. It always feels best when he kills them with his hands, when they die quickly, all at once.

He registers the third kill. He retains some control at the third kill, is still looking around, has it in the back of his mind that Furlan and Isabel will be coming from the other side. They’re here to steal goods, not engage the entire crew. But either Levi’s made too much noise or it’s just shit luck, because people keep coming.

After the third kill, things get hazy.

It feels so good, and Levi needs more, and it is so _easy_ and they just keep _coming_ and it’s autopilot, reflex, and yet the indescribable high of it, euphoric and yet icy, precise – he knows exactly what to do, exactly how to fight, exactly how to kill them in the most efficient way.

It has never felt this good, has never been this overwhelming – Levi feels it all through his body and he could almost call it orgasmic – euphoria and pleasure and a soaring high.

He doesn’t register Furlan and Isabel when they get there. His magic doesn’t see them as a threat and doesn’t see them as a possible kill, recognizes them, so he doesn’t even register when they show up, doesn’t register them even when they start screaming at him, even when Furlan comes up behind him. He doesn’t notice them at all until Furlan wraps an arm around his neck and pulls.

Levi falls backwards, on top of Furlan, and Furlan rolls and has him pinned a moment later. Levi’s fighting style is absolutely not suited for the ground, and Furlan knows it. Levi just stares up at him for a moment, stunned, because his magic still doesn’t register him as a threat even as Furlan squeezes on the underside of his wrist so hard it hurts, forcing him to drop the knife he was holding. Furlan swipes it away, the blade skittering across the deck. It takes until then for Levi to jolt back to reality.

“Get off,” Levi says. He pushes upwards, not at full strength, still confused as to why Furlan is on top of him, why he stopped him.

Furlan bares down harder, has Levi’s wrists pinned down. “You need to calm the fuck down,” Furlan says. “You need to calm the fuck down right now, Levi.”

“Get off,” Levi says, harder this time. He throws weight against his movements now, struggles, but Furlan has Life magic too, has all the enhanced strength that comes with it, and he’s got Levi in a shit position.

“Relax,” Furlan says. “Look at me – Levi, look at me.”

“Get _off_ ,” Levi yells. Ice crystals materialize over his skin and flames spark up at the same time, none of it touching Furlan though, a reaction rather than a tactic. Levi bucks though, and his wrists where Furlan holds them heat up – it’s a reflex to being held down, now that Levi’s trying to get up, an ingrained effort that he developed when he was a child. It’s only because his magic recognizes Furlan that his wrists only heat up, don’t burst into flames.

As it is, Furlan is forced to let go, hissing at the pain. Levi surges upwards but Furlan draws a knife and suddenly there’s metal against Levi’s throat.

“Back down,” Furlan says, pressing just hard enough with the knife for it to start to dig into his skin, not yet breaking it. “Down, _now_ , Levi.”

There’s a burst of shock, betrayal. Levi still can’t comprehend, and his magic is even more confused, refuses to see Furlan as a threat. But Furlan pushes him down with his free hand, knife at Levi’s throat the whole time.

Levi’s still riding the high of killing but it’s fading fast, leaving an aching, sharp need in its place, a craving that Levi knows is going to become overwhelming if he doesn’t kill again very soon.

The high only ever lasts a couple minutes at most, and even then, that first rush only crests for a few seconds. It’s over fast, and always leaves a desperate, painful craving and instability afterwards.

Levi grabs Furlan’s wrist, the one that holds the knife with both of his hands and starts forcing it away from his neck. Furlan adds his other hand, bears down, and it’s all the opening Levi needs. He jerks Furlan’s knife far enough from his neck to tilt to the side, to get out from under it by moving to the side, and then in one motion releases the pressure so that Furlan drives the knife into the deck while Levi twists out from underneath him, pushing him forward in the process.

Levi stands, reorients. Isabel is fighting off two men, jumping around with her magic, staying out of reach of them mostly. She can handle herself, but two on one is not great odds, and her magic isn’t as suited to fighting as his and Furlan’s are. She blows gusts of air that push them back, and normally she’d be taunting them, but she’s oddly silent. They make eye contact for one moment, and then Levi strides forward, eyes locking in on one of the men.

“Levi!” Furlan yells behind him.

There’s more yelling, more noise, Isabel and Furlan’s voices. Levi doesn’t hear it. He holds out his hand and his knife comes shooting back to him, his Earth magic grabbing the metal of the blade. Levi brings it to a halt in front of him so that he can grab it by the handle.

A piercing pain shoots up his leg and he falters.

He turns, looks down. Sees blood. Looks up. Sees Furlan, knife in hand, blood on it.

Furlan’s stabbed him. He’s actually fucking stabbed him in the thigh.

“What the fuck,” Levi says. “What the –” He throws out an arm, rips the knife out of Furlan’s hand with his Earth magic, sending it shooting off the side of the boat. He pushes his hand forward, palm out, and sends a blast of air at him next, hard enough to send him flying backwards, landing on his ass. Levi turns back to Isabel and the men.

But there Furlan is again. Levi turns, hands itching with magic, but Furlan goes right by him this time, goes to one of the men and –

Hurls him off the side of the boat.

Levi blinks. And then he realizes exactly what Furlan is doing.

“No – no, fuck you,” Levi says. He shoots more air at Furlan, forces him back again. He jumps for the other man, but Isabel has gotten the plan now too, and shoots him away from Levi with her own burst of air, back towards Furlan, who’s getting up again. The two of them get him to the edge of the boat and throw him over before Levi can reach him.

Levi runs to the edge of the boat anyway, looks down at where the men are flailing in the water. Levi can’t swim. The high is almost gone, the beginnings of shock starting to filter in. Levi aims his knife, is going to shoot it with Earth magic down at one of the men, but Isabel tackles him to the ground first.

She sits on top of him, and Furlan grabs his wrists and pins them down.

“Your eyes are fucking silver, Levi,” Furlan says.

“Look at me. Look at me,” Isabel says. “ _Hey_ , eyes, Levi, look at me.”

“Fuck off, get off,” Levi says, struggling.

“Look at me, relax, big bro,” Isabel says.

Levi struggles for a few another minute, but the bloodlust fades, the craving disappearing, and then Levi starts shaking.

He remembers very little after that. Shaking uncontrollably, Furlan all but carrying him back to their place, vomiting, crying, fucking _whimpering_ at the pain. Unexplainable terror and anger and manic hysteria, in a constant cycle. He’s near delusional for an entire day afterwards. He’s never gone into shock so bad. He’s never felt more shit in his life.

When he finally comes out of it, he wakes on his bed, feeling hazy and weak.

“How many?” he says, sitting up, wincing at the remaining ache in his body. Isabel perks up from where she’d been sleeping in a chair next to him. Furlan comes in through the door with a glass of water.

“How many you killed?” he says. His voice is sharp and yet resigned, exhausted. “Eight.”

Levi’s stomach drops. Eight. The most he’s ever killed before at one time is six. And that was only once. Every other time it’s been four or less.

“Fuck,” Levi says.

“How do you feel?” Furlan says. He looks wary, expression forced to something more neutral than Levi knows he feels. A sinking fear seeps into Levi’s bones. He starts focusing on his magic.

He can feel it, the corruption. It’s a thin, faint chaotic, unstable presence under his magic. His stomach tightens to a ball. He can’t usually feel it unless he’s in bloodlust.

“Lee?” Furlan says.

Levi swallows. “Better,” he says.

“Lee, how’s your magic?” Furlan says. His voice has gone soft but insistent.

Levi swallows again, looks down. “Fine.”

“Levi.”

Levi closes his eyes for a moment, grits his teeth. “I can feel it. Only barely. I’m okay.”

“Alright,” Furlan says, and Levi knows that they’ll be having another conversation about this later, knows Furlan’s going to bring up getting it sealed again, knows he’s only letting it go right now because Levi’s still recovering and feels shit.

Levi knows he’ll need to get it sealed again too. Not yet – he can only barely feel it, but he’ll need it sealed again. Soon.

_Fuck_.

22 Spring

Underground, Outer East

Levi sleeps fitfully for the rest of the night, exhausted but unable to fall into any kind of deep sleep. It’s not unusual for him to wake up in a panic, heart clamoring and magic already manifesting on his skin, but he rarely remembers his nightmares. When he does remember, they are usually some twisted form of memory.

He sleeps fitfully, and only really wakes up late the next morning, when Erwin and Hange arrive with breakfast.

Levi feels a rush of dread as they enter, sinks back into the bed some more. He remembers what Hange said, about needing to check for more damage. He doesn’t want another ritual right now either. He wants a break and knows he can’t have one.

“How are you feeling, Levi?” Erwin says, putting down a tray on the counter next to them, passing out plates to Furlan and Isabel. Furlan puts one plate on Levi’s lap. Levi looks down at it. Toast and some oatmeal, an egg. The second he smells it, he feels sick.

Levi doesn’t answer, just looks up at Erwin, the closest to a glare he can currently get. _How do you think?_ Levi thinks. He’s not using any telepathy but Erwin seems to get the message anyway – he winces.

“You should try eating something,” Erwin says.

Furlan presses a cup of water into his hand and puts a fork on his plate as well. Levi looks down at it and takes a few sips of water, pushes oatmeal around with his fork.

He doesn’t want to eat. He wants to get the ritual and whatever the hell else Four-Eyes has to do over with. His chest constricts a little more. He can’t take the waiting, just wants to get it all done with.

“What do you have to do?” Levi says. “My lungs or whatever – what do you need to do?”

“It can wait a bit,” Erwin says, “try to eat first.”

Levi picks at his food. He eats as much as he can stomach before pushing it on Isabel. She stubbornly argues with him until he tells her if he eats one more bite he’s going to vomit all over her. She grumbles and eats what was left on his plate.

Hange gives him a potion, inserts the needle, snaps on the rune cuff. Levi’s at least used to that part by now. She does something which makes his magic prickle but doesn’t hurt, and then she frowns.

“You’ve got minor points of damage all over the place, but your body is still healing itself well – I don’t know why the last ritual hurt your lungs so much. It wasn’t like that right away, I would have noticed if it was.”

“What does that mean?” Isabel says.

Hange shrugs. “Means he should be fine, but it could happen again. If anything starts hurting worse than normal then come get me right away.”

“Great,” Levi says.

“Do you want to skip the ritual this morning?” Erwin says.

_Yes_ , Levi thinks. “No,” Levi says. He holds up his arm where the rune cuff is attached. “Already got the fucking thing on.”

He really doesn’t want the fucking ritual but he won’t let himself skip one now. If he skips one, he’ll skip more, and he needs to be done with this whole shit show as soon as possible.

It’s as shit as it always is. Levi suffers through it, wants to cry, doesn’t. He keeps his eyes shut, as if that can somehow block out the pain too. He lets out growls and half yells through gritted teeth when it becomes too much. He squeezes Furlan’s hand, tries to focus on Isabel’s hand on his shoulder.

It ends and he’s left with the aching pain instead, exhausted, skin feeling raw and irritated. Hange and Erwin leave as usual. Levi tries to ignore the voice in his head telling him he’ll need to do it all over again in only a few hours. And Levi wonders how the hell he’s going to get through another week of this.


	3. Devil's Ditch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Levi has the last of the rituals. Erwin, Hange, and Mike start to uncover something strange in the Underground.

22 Late Summer

Underground, Devil’s Ditch

Erwin watches Levi where he’s crouched, body tense, alert, magic thrumming. His eyes are sharp in the darkness, reflect the little light they have, sitting behind the window of a deserted building, up on the fourth floor – the glass long since gone, if it was ever there at all.

“How do you feel?” Erwin says.

“Good. Calm,” Levi says. He glances over at Erwin. “You just worry about covering me.”

_Easier said than done_ , Erwin thinks. It’ll be the first time Levi’s had a real fight against a human that’s not practice, and it’s not like their practice had been going spectacularly either.

“Wait for me to follow you, don’t leave my line of sight,” Erwin says, again.

“Can we go now or what?” Levi says.

Erwin takes a deep breath. Mike will be in position in the building across the street. Erwin will follow Levi closely and cover him from any Psychic attacks. Mike will drop in right after them from his position in the building across the street, fend off any devils which attempt to chase them inside. Furlan and Isabel are waiting together on the other side of the building, also to fight off any devils which come running. And Hange is hanging from the ceiling of the underground, almost directly above the building they’re about to enter, waiting with the explosives. Levi will take lead in capturing the third tier Witch inside.

“Well?” Levi says.

Erwin takes a deep breath and opens his mouth, expression setting, about to give the call.

It is at that moment that there is a strike of light, a resounding, echoing boom so loud that the building shakes, and a titan appears, ten meters high and not two meters away from the window.

Erwin’s entire body goes cold as a giant eye levels with his own.

Spring 22

Underground, Outer East

Levi has a bad day. Erwin knows he’s having a bad day the second he walks into the infirmary with Hange and he feels the anxiety and dread along with a bitter depression coming off him. It’s a worrying and growing factor that Erwin picks up on from Levi’s mind. It’s hard for Erwin to say how bad it is, or if it’s really new and growing worse as it feels like it is, or if it’s just Levi lowering his mental defenses more often and more fully around him.

Furlan and Isabel have apparently picked up on it too, though they don’t have Psychic magic like Erwin does to help them – Isabel’s sitting on the bed with Levi today, side by side on the thin bed, something that Erwin’s only seen her do a handful of times. Furlan’s hand is on Levi’s knee. They both exude a keener sense of worry and shared pain than normal.

The first ritual of the day is rough. It’s nearly painful the way Levi’s anxiety spikes when Hange takes out the rune cuff. Psychic mages can unconsciously project emotions when they get overwhelmed, and the stronger their magic the stronger the projection. Erwin has to actively put up mental blocks to keep it out. The others won’t feel it, only him because he also has Psychic magic.

When Levi had his lungs healed by Hange, when they’d had to restrain him and he’d started crying, the desperation and pain and fear he’d been projecting had been enough to make Erwin want to vomit. This isn’t nearly as bad, but Levi clearly has a harder time than normal with the ritual, whether it’s actually more painful or just because he’s not feeling well today. When the ritual is over, Erwin lets out a breath of relief, a tension that he always holds during them releasing again.

That is, until he feels the sudden spike in fear and despair, desperation, coming from Levi right after Hange finishes.

It’s odd, and hasn’t happened before. He’s not calming down, he’s getting worse. Erwin doesn’t know what’s going through Levi’s head, and he doesn’t actually look any different, his body relaxing slightly, expression going less tense, but his emotions get more intense and more negative instead of settling again. It’s sharp enough to be worrying.

“Levi,” Erwin says, “are you alright?”

Furlan and Isabel turn to look at Erwin, but Levi tenses, and then suddenly Erwin can feel next to nothing off him, mental defenses back in place.

“Fine,” Levi says.

Hange glances at Erwin. Without looking over at her, Erwin sends the feeling he’d gotten off Levi in a short burst over a telepathic link to her.

_Shit_ , Hange says over the link.

“Levi, would you let me project on you?” Erwin says.

“Do _what?_ ” Levi says.

“Project emotion to you,” Erwin says. “I can help you feel calmer.” He’s a little surprised Levi hasn’t heard of it before. Conscious, deliberate projection is a learned skill, something that has to be taught rather than something more innate, but it’s not terribly uncommon.

Levi’s scowl turns darker though, angry. “Stay out of my head, Smith,” Levi says.

“I can’t do it without your consent anyway, not that I would try to,” Erwin says, “you’d have to lower your defenses and let me project. I don’t need to be all the way in your mind, not in your thoughts or memories or anything, just your emotions.”

“No,” Levi says.

It gets worse over the next two days. Levi’s struggling, it’s clear, and he refuses to go to twice a day, gets angry when they ask him now.

“I think you should tell him he has to do twice a day,” Erwin says. “End of discussion, he _has_ to.”

“He doesn’t though,” Hange says, shaking her head. They sit in their study, late, after another bad ritual – the third ones of the day, the ones they do after dinner, are always the worst. “He’s still healing remarkably well from them.”

“He feels terrible,” Erwin says. “It’s getting worse, and it’s bad enough to be worrying, Hange. I’m concerned.”

“As long as he’s healing from them and he keeps eating enough, then it’s ultimately his choice,” Hange says. “I won’t take that kind of choice away from him unless I have to.”

Erwin sighs. “How much longer does he have?”

“I think five days,” Hange says. “And that will be far enough that I can place the seal.”

The next day, in the evening, Hange and Erwin go in to do the third ritual. Erwin always goes with her, though it’s now less about being there in case he’s needed and more that he wants to both keep an eye on Levi and offer support. He’s still not sure if it’s the right thing to do, but none of them have asked him to leave so he keeps going. He’s no longer concerned about having to restrain Levi during them – save when Hange healed his lungs, it’s never been necessary. Levi never cries, never shouts, never asks for a bite, just shakes and sweats and then has broken, quiet conversations with Furlan and Isabel, half of which Erwin suspects takes place over telepathy, but he can’t hear that.

So, despite the fact that Erwin knows Levi’s been feeling worse lately, he is still very surprised when Levi starts fighting them that day.

It happens all at once, and Erwin feels the crest of desperation and fear, the sudden heightening of pain, a second before Levi sits up abruptly.

“Stop,” he says, “stop, enough – Hange, _stop_.”

“Easy, Levi,” Furlan says, hand on his shoulder, standing up just as suddenly, almost as if he expected it. “It’s almost ov-”

“No, I can’t – I _can’t_ , _Hange_ –”

Hange makes no notice of having heard him. Despite her over enthusiastic and often distracted nature, she focuses very, very well when she needs to. She has had plenty of practice performing rituals in more pressing situations, with larger distractions.

She can’t stop the ritual halfway – the magic becomes unstable and thus very dangerous if she does. It will hurt both her and Levi, and possibly the rest of them as well if she’s unable to contain it.

“Levi, she has to finish,” Erwin says, getting up from his chair as well, a sense of danger shooting up. “She really –”

Levi jumps up and it’s only because Furlan is clearly expecting the movement and grabs him in time, yanking him back, that he doesn’t all but launch himself at Hange.

“Let go, fucking –” Levi says, and then he lets out a cry, doubling over. “Stop – _stop_.”

Erwin grabs for the cuff which will suppress Levi’s magic just as Levi tries to get up again, both Furlan and Isabel grabbing onto him. Ice and sparks break out over Levi’s skin.

“Breathe, Levi, just – ow, fuck –” Furlan says, letting go of Levi’s arm just to pin his shoulder instead, pressing down.

“Get off,” Levi says. “I need a break. I need – I need a fucking minute, _stop_.”

His voice cracks and when Erwin reaches them again, cuff in hand, he sees tears in Levi’s eyes, his face pale but eyes red. Levi’s eyes glance to the cuff and then widen.

“No – _no_ ,” he says. Both Furlan and Isabel let go of him suddenly, hissing in pain. When Erwin touches his arm, trying to get ahold of his wrist, he finds it burning hot, too hot to touch – his Fire magic, just short of breaking out in flames.

A sudden wall of grey mist appears between Erwin and where Levi has his hands drawn back. It’s solid though mostly see through – his Life magic. Erwin’s actually surprised he can do something so advanced when he’s clearly panicking.

“Levi, she has to finish,” Erwin says. “I know it hurts and you’re overwhelmed but she has to finish, if she doesn’t then her magic will become unstable and it will hurt everyone in this room. I promise if we could give you a break, we would.”

Levi hyperventilates behind the Life magic glass he’s created, staring back at him with so much pain and desperation. It makes Erwin’s stomach knot up. The glass disappears, dissolving to mist and evaporating away a few moments later.

Furlan’s back by his side as soon as it’s gone, drawing him into a hug. Levi puts his head down against Furlan’s shoulder, forehead braced against it, so Erwin can still see his face in profile, eyes squeezed shut, teeth gritted, as something close to a sob breaks from his throat.

“It’s alright,” Furlan says, rubbing his back. Isabel’s there as well a moment later, kneeling up on the bed so she can reach him, card fingers through his hair. “It’s alright, it’s almost over,” Furlan says.

“It _hurts_ ,” Levi says, voice cracking and shaking, wet, almost muffled. “It’s so fucking bad.”

“I know, shh,” Furlan says. “Almost done. Almost over. You’re okay.”

Levi’s shoulders shake. He keeps making rough, wet noises of pain for the rest of the ritual. They only last about fifteen minutes, and they were halfway through when Levi started asking Hange to stop. It’s not long before she’s done.

Erwin knows the ritual is over because he feels the physical pain emanating from Levi abruptly decrease and because Hange opens her eyes again, but Levi only lets out a long, shaking breath, otherwise stays exactly as he had been, head still tilted down against Furlan’s shoulder, breathing raggedly, shoulders shaking.

“I’m so sorry, Levi,” Hange says, once she’s done. She gets up at the same time, takes a step towards Levi, but Furlan gives a sharp shake of his head at her, and she freezes.

Erwin hasn’t missed how Levi doesn’t like other people close to him, doesn’t like other people touching him, besides Furlan and Isabel. Hange backs off again. Erwin waits a few moments, debating, before he speaks.

“Levi,” he says, putting effort into keeping his voice steady and calm without sounding pitying or too careful. “Would you let me try projecting? Please? It will help.”

Levi grits his teeth, still doesn’t move. There’s a beat of silence. “Fine,” he says. His voice is rough. “You can try.”

Erwin feels a rush of relief and then carefully reaches out with his magic, prodding at Levi’s mind. Because Levi’s such a strong mage, his magic is thick and dense around his mind. It is also startlingly chaotic, not to mention combative. His magic bumps against Erwin’s, deflecting it, pushing it away, even attacking it. It’s not something that Levi’s consciously doing, but Erwin finds he has to fight to get far enough into Levi’s head to do anything more than read his emotions. He’s as gentle as he can be as he goes. Normally, this would not be difficult, and someone, even someone with Psychic magic, would barely feel him enter their minds, as he only needs to do so at a surface level to intentionally project. But Levi is strong enough and his magic naturally aggressive enough that it’s a bit more difficult.

Eventually Erwin works his way in and starts trying to project calm and peace. He has to focus on his own breathing, calming himself, thinks of happy memories and peaceful moments to latch onto the feeling, and then projects that with his magic into Levi’s mind.

He’s sure it must only have a mild effect – he’s simply not able to get enough magic into Levi’s head to do more than that without his presence becoming very uncomfortable if not painful for Levi.

He hears Levi’s breathing slow though, watches as he untenses slowly. It clearly helps, though Erwin doesn’t know to what degree exactly. He feels Levi’s emotions soften though, finally, becoming less intense, not quite as harsh. The worst of the desperation fades completely. The anxiety doesn’t leave but it does become much quieter. The pain and depression underneath it all doesn’t change though.

Erwin continues projecting until Levi’s calmed down as much as Erwin thinks he’s going to get. He retreats slowly – it can be jarring to leave all at once.

“I hope that helps,” Erwin says once he’s done. “Can we do anything else? Can we get anything for you?

“Tea,” Isabel says.

“I’ll get tea,” Erwin says.

Hange has a very complicated ritual that she can perform to detect demonic presence, but more often than not they rely on Mike’s nose and Erwin’s Psychic magic to track them down. Hange’s ritual is more in depth and takes a while, so it’s only very useful when they need to survey a large area – say, the entire Underground.

Witches have three main abilities: amulets, spells, and rituals. First tier witches can only make amulets, second tier witches can make amulets and perform spells. Third tier witches are the only ones who can perform rituals.

The differences between the three are subtle – amulets work through runes. Rituals harness energy from different ingredients, while spells do not require anything but the Witch’s own magic. Powerful third tier Witches like Hange often mix the three to create more complex and advanced effects. The rituals she is currently performing on Levi to push back the corruption are actually almost entirely spell work – she is technically harnessing some of the magic in his blood, and there is a very small bit of Nightshade in the potion she gives him which helps as well. Potions themselves are a mix of spellwork and rituals too, as they are the product of binding spells to other ingredients.

They had been waiting the past three weeks since they first arrived in the Underground for Hange’s friend and colleague Moblit to send her a key ingredient needed for the ritual to search for demonic presence. It finally arrives and Hange sets up and performs the ritual. The end product is a rough map with burn marks wherever there is demonic presence. Really, calling it a map is a bit of an exaggeration – on a thin piece of wood, burn marks appear on the wood relative to their location. So a burn mark in the top right of the board is a demon northeast of them, approximately one mile per three centimeters. A demon in the center of the board is right next to them.

There is a very faint mark in the very center of the board. Erwin looks at it and frowns.

“It’s Levi,” Hange says, wiping sweat from her forehead.

“What the hell is that?” Mike says, pointing at a rather large scorch mark on the upper left side.

Erwin frowns as well. He has very rarely seen a mark that wide and dark. That has to either be a mistake or a huge population of demons.

“There’s a ton of them, I could feel it,” Hange says. The board is a representation of the sense she gets off it – the ritual is two part – Hange channels the information into the board, and in the process gets a rapid, but more in depth, sense of the landscape.

“Bizarre,” Erwin says.

“Devils climb out of the earth when they’re born or summoned,” Hange says, a musing expression on her face, intrigue. “Maybe more of them are born here since it’s underground.”

The general teachings are that devils climb their way from hell in the center of the earth, but Hange theorizes that they are merely born underground, either as small larvae, in naturally occurring underground caves, or in holes dug by adult devils, and then dig their way to the surface. It does not explain why they disintegrate when killed though.

“Here though,” she says. “There’s something very strange.”

On the piece of wood it doesn’t look like anything out of the ordinary – there’s a couple of burned marks, so maybe two or three demons. There’s quite a lot of devils in the underground, probably a few corruptions too (corruptions are much harder to kill than either devils or titans, and they live indefinitely unless killed by hunters, unlike devils which are known to die of other causes).

“What’s so special about it?” Mike says.

“I don’t know,” Hange says. “It just felt very strange. We should investigate!”

“I think we should figure out what the hell this is first,” Mike says, putting his finger on the large scorched mark in the upper left corner.

Since Levi is still insisting on doing three rituals a day (Erwin had tried, again, after the last terrible round, to get Levi to agree to go back down to two, but he is continuing to be annoyingly stubborn), they have to time their outing. They are about to go at night (as it makes little difference considering they are underground) when Erwin gets an idea, and goes to the infirmary.

“Do you know why there could be so many demons in one place?” Erwin asks, after he’s finished explaining the way the ritual worked, showing them the board.

“Yeah, it’s Devil’s Ditch,” Furlan says, almost immediately.

“Devil’s Ditch?” Erwin says.

“You haven’t heard of Devil’s Ditch?” Isabel says.

“There’s a shit ton of the fuckers up there,” Furlan says

“Is this a literal ditch?” Erwin says, confused.

“More of a valley,” Furlan says. “It’s between Fifth Circle and the north side of the harbor.”

“Is this part of the city?” Erwin says. “Are there people living there?”

“Not very many,” Furlan says. “Some rogue Witches, pretty sure that cult is still kicking around there. It’s mostly deserted.”

“Why are there so many of them there?” Erwin says.

Furlan shrugs.

“Devils do like to congregate,” Hange says. “And if that’s the lowest part of the Underground, maybe they just naturally climb their way out over there more often.”

“Hm,” Erwin says.

“This is so exciting!” Hange says. “I wonder if we’ll see any corruptions!”

Furlan frowns and Erwin sighs. “Hange,” He says.

“What, they’re interesting, I’ve been trying to catch one for years.”

Furlan and Isabel both frown now. Levi, oddly enough, just looks amused. Erwin pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Anyway, we’re off,” Hange says, throwing up her hands. “Don’t miss us too much!”

Devil’s Ditch looks the same as much of the outer edges of the underground looks – the buildings are the same, just more run down. It was obviously a place where people lived at some point, but Furlan was right and it’s mostly deserted now. They see fewer people as they get farther in.

At first, Erwin senses demonic presence in snatches, sporadically, but as they get closer to the corresponding location of the large scorch mark on their map, it turns constant. He ignores it for the most part, only paying attention in so far as to make sure none are about to appear and attack them. They’re not here to try to kill devils today, just there to do some reconnaissance. They’re looking for any rogue witches who could be summoning devils here (though why in the world they’d want to do that in the underground, Erwin has no idea. Usually witches summon them as attack dogs, but there are tons of them here already – it’s less difficult to bind an existing devil to you than to summon one). That, and they’re looking to see if there are any areas that they could use magical explosives on – anywhere with a large amount of demons and no people.

They find a couple of demon hordes – devils tend to congregate. Corruptions also attract devils. Corruptions are semi-sentient, more intelligent than devils certainly, and present a much bigger challenge.

They find one.

Mike notices first. He stops on a rooftop. “Wait,” he says, sniffs, tilts his head. He points with his blade at a building to their right. “Corruption,” he says.

Hange nearly squeals. She takes off before Erwin can stop her, hanging between buildings to try to get a look through the windows.

She shouldn’t have bothered. Only a few moments later Erwin spots it coming onto the roof, a few devils appearing with it, growling, pacing around threateningly on the flat roof of the building, all looking at them.

Erwin feels a chill go down his spine. He’s only come up against corruptions twice before. He’s used to devils – they act and remind him of a cross between a rabid wolf and a bear, large, grey-skinned, silver eyes. Erwin’s killed many of them.

The corruption has the shape of a man, silver eyes as well, bluish-grey skin, hairless. This one has wrinkles, drawn up skin, missing teeth – it’s old, was old when it turned, which is rare.

Corrupted chaos magic is very rare, and while anyone with Life, Psychic, or Witchery magic will be able to feel the corruption once it manifests far enough, generally around the ages of four to six, often times people don’t realize what they are feeling, and thus children don’t get corrupted magic sealed, and will then turn once they hit puberty and the bouts of bloodlust start. The other two corruptions that Erwin has seen looked like adolescents, though it was hard to gauge age with the blue-tinged skin and distorted features. Corruptions stopped aging once they turned.

It looks straight back at them, silver eyes shining, mouth open, pulled up into what could be a smile, blue skin and blood red gums.

“Ooh, ooh, out of the way, out of the way, quick,” Hange says, jumping back up onto the roof. She starts throwing things out of a bag she brought. She finally pulls out an amulet, pauses to look at it like it’s a piece of gold, and then she hurls it across the expanse onto the other roof.

The corruption looks down as it lands only a few feet away from it. Hange clasps her hands together then, closing her eyes. Erwin sees her ring start glowing. He looks over to see the amulet start glowing over on the roof as well.

The corruption squints at it, then kneels down and picks it up, staring at it. A few moments later it stops glowing. The corruption stares at it a few more moments, then drops it again. Hange’s getting a sample of the thing’s magic – all magic leaves a distinct signature, and corruptions, though it’s a distorted type of magic, do retain some of their magic from before they turn.

Erwin looks over at Hange to see her eyes wide, silent, staring across at the corruption. Erwin frowns. “What is it?” he says.

“I think,” she says, “that before it turned, that man was related to Levi.”

Levi is sitting in the study playing cards, where Furlan and Isabel dragged him, when Hange bursts in, throwing both the doors open with a bang. He winces.

“Levi,” she says. “Did you have any relatives with corrupted magic? Any old relatives, male I think?”

“Dunno,” Levi says. The only relative he ever knew was his mom. Well, his mom and then most likely Kenny. Levi suspects that Kenny was his father, but he doesn’t know that.

“We saw a corruption,” she says, all but jumping into the seat next to him. “I got a sample of his magic. I think he’s related to you.”

“Hm,” Levi says. Chaos magic runs in families, and only chaos magic can be corrupted – it wouldn’t be shocking.

“Did your relatives all have chaos magic?” Hange asks.

“I only knew my mother,” Levi says. “She did. Tier one though. I don't think it was corrupted. She's dead, anyway.”

“Interesting,” Hange says, with much too strong of a manic look in her eyes.

16 Summer

Underground, Seventh Circle

When Levi is sixteen, he knows he needs to get the corruption resealed. He knows this, can feel his magic getting unstable, knows he’s killed too many people, but he doesn’t go see the Witch, pushes it from his mind. It’s _fine_. It can be put off just a little longer.

By then, Furlan knows that Levi has corrupted magic, and he knows that corrupted magic has to be sealed. And then the turf war with Red Eye happens, and Levi kills five people in a row, completely succumbs to the bloodlust, and goes into shock afterwards.

“Hey, Levi, hey,” Furlan says. It’s the first thing Levi processes after about the second death. The rest is a blurry red haze. Furlan’s hands are on his shoulders, crouched to be at Levi’s eye level, looking freaked out and worried.

Levi blinks at him. The high and euphoria fades to leave a sick, numbing instability.

Furlan’s only seen him go into shock once before, and he’d only killed three people then. This time is worse.

Levi falls to his knees and gasps, unable to breathe, ears ringing. The next couple hours blur together, his emotions utterly unstable, scared and then angry and then despairing. He vomits twice, doesn’t stop trembling the whole time. The other members of Furlan’s gang ask what’s wrong with him and Furlan makes up excuses.

The next day Furlan brings up that maybe he needs to get it sealed again. Levi brushes him off.

Levi keeps brushing him off for another two months. His magic grows more and more unstable, the bloodlust ramps up rapidly, the cravings getting more frequent. The whole time Furlan nags at him, growing increasingly exasperated and angry, resulting in a couple of fights. It goes on until Levi suddenly, and without meaning too, accidently almost takes Furlan’s head off with a chunk of stone the size of a fist.

And then Levi agrees to go.

The day of the appointment Furlan insists on going with him, if only to make sure he actually goes. Furlan is surprised at how nervous Levi is, at how he wipes his palms on his pants, how he looks like he’s going to be sick, how his walk slows to all but a crawl as they get closer.

_He’s terrified_ , Furlan realizes.

“It hurts like a bitch,” Levi had told him, a year earlier, when he first told Furlan about the corruption. He’d said it off hand, with only a grimace.

Furlan realizes before they arrive that it must hurt a hell of a lot more than Levi made it out to.

By the time they actually get inside, Levi is stiff and tight-lipped, and they’re small and sporadic but Furlan notices sparks popping up on his skin. Levi knocks, a man opens the door, takes a long look at Levi. “Ackerman,” he says, and then he steps aside for them to walk in.

They go up a staircase, and Furlan sees Levi’s hands start trembling. When the man opens a door at the top of the staircase for them Levi flinches suddenly, turning away from the entryway like he’s just been struck by something.

“Fuck,” Levi says, hands going to his head. Furlan reaches out and touches his arm, below his elbow.

“You okay?” Furlan says. He’s never seen Levi this afraid, this obviously nervous, and it’s starting to freak him out.

Levi screws his eyes shut and grasps Furlan’s wrist, squeezing tightly. His shoulders shake now too. “It’s –” he says, and his voice is tight and scared, “it’s my Psychic magic, this is – fuck – it does not want me to go in there.”

Furlan looks past Levi into the room, suddenly on alert. Levi’s psychic magic going off like that means that there’s something dangerous, something bad, and Furlan’s never seen Levi physically recoil from it before. He starts pulling a knife, starts angling himself in front of Levi.

“What is it?” he says, but inside the room all he sees is an old woman sitting by a fire in what looks like a very ordinary room.

Levi shakes his head. “No, it’s – _fuck_ , it means I’m really, really not gonna fucking like this.”

His voice starts shaking worse, and Furlan looks back at him then, returns his focus to Levi, who’s starting to breathe too fast, to look like he’s about to bolt. “Hey, it’s alright,” Furlan says.

Levi shakes his head. “Shit, I – I hoped it be better, since – I mean I was fucking nine years old last time, but this is – my magic’s gone batshit, Fur, I can’t do this.”

Furlan knows that Levi isn’t as invincible or as stoic as he appears to most people – Furlan knows him too well for that – but it is still extremely unsettling to see him so upset, so scared, when he’s normally so reserved. He hesitates, wants to tell Levi that they’ll just go then, they’ll come back, but Furlan knows Levi needs this.

“It’s gonna be fine,” Furlan says instead.

“It’s not – it – I can _feel_ how not fine it’s gonna be,” Levi says.

Before Furlan can respond, a voice comes from inside the room, the old woman sitting there – they’d been talking in low tones but the last sentence Levi had said louder. “Your magic doesn’t want to be sealed, dear,” she says, “it will make your Psychic magic react more strongly than it would otherwise.” Both Furlan and Levi look up at her. She has an almost grim expression. “You’ve waited too long, Levi, come in.”

Levi tenses and doesn’t move and Furlan, with his hands still grasping Levi’s arm, starts to steer him in. “Come on,” he says, “it’ll be alright.”

Levi walks slowly, still shaking, into the room. His eyes dart around once inside, and he’s still completely tense, like he’s ready for a fight or to run the second he needs to. Levi’s vision tunnels in on the woman and fractured memories play across his mind. He remembers this room, remembers Kenny bringing him here, remembers the woman’s face and the needles and the fear from the first time, with his mother. He feels like walking down a tunnel. He can’t tell what’s his own fear and what’s his magic any longer – just that everything is telling him to get out of there and somehow he walks forward instead.

“Take off your shirt and lie down, on your stomach,” she says. “We’ll need to block your magic this time – you’ve grown quite strong, dear.”

Levi feels numb as he takes his shirt off, dread and panic filling his chest, his bones, his skin. He sits down on the bed but then freezes there, staring at the kit which the woman has opened, the rune cuff and needles inside. She pulls out another two metal cuffs – these don’t look like the rune cuffs, though they also have runes inscribed on their sides.

“Your wrists, dear,” she says, holding out a hand.

Levi feels a blast of alarm and dread and fear the second she says it, his Psychic magic so strong it makes him lean backwards, away from her. Levi shakes his head before he can register the act. He looks from her and then to Furlan. Furlan’s got a resigned grimace on his face that smooths out once he sees Levi looking at him.

“No,” Levi says. No, he cannot possibly put those things on his wrists, no, something is wrong, something is horribly wrong – he needs to leave, he needs to –

“Levi, hey, it’s alright,” Furlan says and Levi’s eyes snap back to him again as Furlan puts his hands on Levi’s shoulders. “It’s alright.”

Levi keeps looking at Furlan as he feels thin fingers gently take his wrist. He keeps looking at Furlan as he feels metal encase his wrist, locking shut. He keeps looking at Furlan as he shakes and his breath starts to hitch and his eyes start to burn and the woman takes his other wrist as well.

“On your stomach now,” she says.

Furlan moves. The bed is not in the same place as it was the last time Levi was there. It is maybe not even the same bed. Furlan moves around to the other side of the bed, the opposite side as the woman, so that when Levi lowers himself down onto his stomach he can turn his head away from her and look at Furlan, who takes his hand and squeezes.

Levi feels fingers on his arm, and he shuts his eyes as she inserts the needle.

Another burst of alarm and now startlingly sharp fear hits him so abruptly and strongly that he gasps. He tries to pull his arm away but she has it in her grip and the second he tries to do more than a small tug the man from before grabs his arm to steady it. Levi closes his eyes and feels his throat tighten up. He feels the tears in his eyes well over and spill down the sides of his face. He holds in a sob.

A moment later the rune cuff snaps into place and Levi flinches at the sharp pain, tries to flinch away again. Furlan squeezes his hand.

“It’s alright,” he says again.

Both of Levi’s hands are suddenly pulled upwards. It startles him, realizes a second later that it’s the cuffs around his wrists – they bring his hands upwards and then still there. Levi pulls against it and finds he can’t move them at all. They’re not just to block his magic – they’re to restrain him as well.

Another burst of panic – and Levi can’t tell if it’s his own fear at suddenly realizing he’s being restrained or if it’s his magic – and then the woman is pressing something to his teeth.

“Bite down,” she says.

_Wait_ , Levi wants to say, is going to say, but when he opens his mouth the piece of leather is put between his teeth and Levi finds himself biting down hard anyway.

The first jolt of pain starts only a moment later.

Levi screams around the bit. He screams as it feels like his entire body is set on fire. He thrashes, lashes out in a mindless, desperate attempt to escape the pain. His vision goes black, ears ringing – the only thing he registers is the all-encompassing, agonizing pain.

He screams and screams and goes dizzy and then the pain lessens, enough that he can think again but not enough for it to be anything less than unbearable. Tears fall down his face.

_Stop, stop, stop, no more,_ he tries to send with his telepathy, but it’s blocked, he can’t connect to it right – it’s the cuffs, blocking his magic. He can’t open his mouth. He can’t unlock his teeth.

He feels pressure on his hips, hands, and then a sharp pain, like a knife, in the center of his back. He screams around the bit again, tries to flinch away.

“Shh, shh, easy dear,” the woman says, “the faster I get this done the sooner it’s over.”

The sharp pain moves across his back – a circle – she’s making the mark on his back, he realizes. He’s got two already – they look like tattoos but he’s positive tattoos don’t hurt this much – she’ll put a circle around the dot and the smaller circle already there. He doesn’t know how she’s making the marks – if it’s magic or ink or both – just that it hurts like absolute hell.

If he was awake or aware for any part of the sealings beyond the first few seconds before, then he doesn’t remember it. He remembers it only as a sudden, unbearable, indescribable pain all over his body, and then waking up afterwards.

His body apparently wants him awake this time – or rather, apparently now that he’s older his body is strong enough to keep him awake this time, and it is a terrible, horrific realization.

He’d thought it would be better since he was older – that maybe it just _seemed_ like hell because he was so young. He was wrong.

The stabbing pain in his back ceases for a moment and Levi sags, a single beat of reprieve – and then that same circle of stabbing pain is doused in fire. At least, that is what it feels like as Levi arches and screams.

His vision blacks out, his ears ring with noise, and he sinks down to semi-consciousness and stays there this time. He feels the pain but isn’t aware of anything else, thoughts too difficult to grab onto, the pain taking over. Afterwards, he remembers it only as a haze of pain until the cuffs are being taken off his wrists.

Levi blinks slowly. His face is wet and sticky. His jaw aches. But mostly there is a deep seated pain throughout his whole body, an ache and a stinging, burning pressure in all his joints, in his chest, his back, his head. His skin feels raw. He feels his wrists being released from the cuffs and looks up at them. He sees blood and is confused for a moment, because he barely feels the cuts on his wrists where he pulled too hard, can hardly feel it underneath the aching, burning pain. The rune cuff is taken off, the needle removed. He feels a hand on his shoulder.

“Hey, Levi,” Furlan says.

Levi says nothing. Everything hurts. It hurts badly. Every tiny movement sets it off. He feels so weak, doesn’t feel like he can speak.

“It’s all over,” Furlan says. Levi feels his hand on his shoulder and back, rubbing back and forth. It sends prickles across his skin and Levi can’t tell if it’s soothing or just painful. He doesn’t try to tell Furlan to stop though. Furlan sits there for a few more moments. “You wanna try to sit up?” Furlan says.

_No,_ Levi says with his telepathy, connected to his magic once again, because moving his mouth, trying to speak, seems terribly difficult. _It hurts,_ he says, as he trembles, _I can’t – I can’t move, it hurts._

_Okay,_ Furlan says. _We’ll stay then. We’ll stay as long as you want._

22 Spring

Underground, Outer East

The last few days of rituals are terrible, seem to go by excruciatingly slowly. Levi doesn’t ask them to stop in the middle of any again though, doesn’t let Smith do whatever that projection shit was either. Levi’s embarrassed by how upset he got, how he lost control, nearly started crying, and he's ashamed that he’d lashed out during it. It hadn’t hurt worse than the other ones, he’d just… snapped, needed a break, couldn’t have it. It doesn’t happen again.

It is finally, finally going to be over. One more day of rituals. Just one more and then he’ll be done.

And then he’ll need the sealing ritual.

Levi tells himself that maybe it won’t be as painful. It’s a temporary seal, Hange said, it isn’t as strong. So maybe that means it won’t be as painful to put on as the more permanent seals that he’s been given before. They won’t need to physically mark him at least, so there won’t be the burning pain over his back as the dark mark gets branded into his skin. He’d passed out when they’d given him the temporary seal last time, when they’d first met – maybe he’ll pass out again.

He tells himself it’s stupid to be afraid – it will only last ten, fifteen minutes at max, and then it will just ache for a couple days afterwards. The dread just keeps mounting though, the closer it gets.

He’s curled up on his bed, under the blankets, in the afternoon, a couple hours after the last ritual, several hours still until his next one, his last one to push back the corruption, eyes closed, trying to tell himself that it won’t be so bad. He feels a sharp poke to his shoulder.

He tenses, turns his head just a little farther down. He gets another poke.

“Levi, I know you’re awake – get up!” Another poke and Levi groans, shrugging his shoulder away. “Big bro!”

“What?” Levi says. Isabel moves to tugging his blanket away and Levi grips it tighter. “Go away.”

“Come on Levi, Isabel sweet talked some money out of Erwin, we’re going to the market,” Furlan says. “And by we I mean you too – let’s go.”

“I’m tired,” Levi says. “I’m supposed to be resting.”

“You’ve been resting all day,” Isabel says. “Come on, big bro, we’re buying pie!”

“Pie?” Levi says.

“We’re going to get you some celebratory no-longer-on-the-verge-of-turning-into-a-demon wine too,” Furlan says. “Hange wants to throw a party.”

Levi pulls the blanket a little closer again. “I’m gonna feel like shit tomorrow anyway,” he says.

“Then you can drink it two days from now or three or whenever you’re feeling better,” Furlan says. “Come on, you can pick out some expensive tea and everything.”

“Furlan, I don’t want to go,” Levi says. His body aches, moving at all exacerbates it, and he’s not having this cheer-up-Levi fest. If they think they’re being subtle with their attempts to distract him from tomorrow’s sealing ritual than they are very mistaken.

Isabel pokes him again. Levi looks up only enough to glare at her. When she goes to poke him again he pushes out Life magic and makes a shield of it over his shoulder. She pokes him in the ribs and Levi growls.

“Come on!” she says.

“I’m tired,” Levi says.

“No you’re not, you’ve been lying in bed all day,” she says. “Let’s go, Levi, it’ll be fun!”

“Come on, Lee, it won’t do any good for you to just keep lying there wallowing,” Furlan says.

Levi refocuses his glare on Furlan. “I’m _resting_.”

“Well now you’re pouting,” Furlan says.

Furlan ducks just in time for the metal cup Levi hurls at him with his Earth magic to miss, clattering against the wall and to the ground behind him. Furlan continues without missing a beat.

“You’ll just make yourself feel worse,” Furlan says, “sitting there thinking about it all day. Come on, we’re really going to get stuff to celebrate – I know it’s been hell but after tomorrow it’ll be over.”

“Yeah until I kill someone and have to get it done again,” Levi says. He can’t help the bitter despair that wells up. Every few months, Hange had said, and every time he kills someone, even if it’s just one person. He’d thought getting the sealing rituals once every six or so years was bad.

Isabel hits him on the head. Levi tries to duck as she does it again, making a noise of protest, then throws up another Life magic shield when she doesn’t stop, punctuating each hit, “Stop – being – pessi–mistic!”

“Fuck off,” Levi says, only for Furlan to grab the arm he’d put up to block Isabel’s hits, hauling him upwards.

“Come on, get dressed, we’re going,” Furlan says.

Levi groans.

Levi will admit to himself that it does wind up being nice to have a distraction, but the two-hour trip has him utterly exhausted by the time Furlan and Isabel are done at the market. Erwin and Hange had apparently collectively given them a fair amount of money to spend – Erwin to Isabel for pie and tea to try to cheer Levi up with, and Hange to Furlan with the instructions to buy whatever alcohol and food they wanted for the celebration, along with the largest bottle of rum they could find.

Levi picks out the tea he wants, and then mostly stands back as Isabel haggles over prices and Furlan gleefully fills a box with wine, then another with liquor.

“How many people are you expecting at this celebration?” Levi says, one eyebrow raised.

“Hange said to spend it all,” he says. “And I know how much you can drink.”

Levi’s magic starts acting up around sunrise the next morning. He’s gotten used to the waves of alarm, warning, that his Psychic magic gives off before every ritual, but it hasn’t ever been this strong. He starts feeling sick, remembers how bad his Psychic magic had reacted the last time he got it sealed. He’s anxious enough on his own – he doesn’t need his magic making it worse.

He didn’t sleep at all, had just lay on the bed, read some, all night. The sense of alarm continues to grow until Levi can’t keep his breathing calm anymore, can’t stop the panic that starts to climb up his throat.

“Furlan,” he says. He squeezes his eyes shut as another blast of alarm runs through him, magic clamoring. His intuition is almost never this strong, and it’s almost painful trying to resist the urge to run. “Furlan.”

“What? Yeah, I’m awake,” Furlan says, sitting up, rubbing at his eyes. A moment later he’s standing next to Levi, a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, what’s going on? What’s wrong?”

“I wanna do it now,” Levi says, forces the words out as his magic flares in response. He can’t take the waiting any longer, knows the feeling is only going to get worse. “It fucking – my magic is –”

“Okay,” Furlan says. “Okay, I’ll go get them.”

Levi tries to breathe as Furlan leaves the room, Isabel waking up as he goes. He tries to breathe slower, tries to ignore the tension in his body, how he feels like he’s going to be sick. Isabel takes his hand, talks to him.

When the door opens again Levi flinches, turning away. “Fuck,” he says. His magic is not happy with him. The only other times his Psychic magic has gone off so much were his previous sealing, when he was sixteen, and the couple of times that he, Furlan, or Isabel have come very, very close to dying. When Furlan fell off a roof, five stories up, when Levi got shot in the stomach, when Isabel almost got shot in the head. He cringes, keeps his head turned away from Hange, the sense of alarm coming from her the most.

Hange hands Erwin a potion and Erwin hands it to Levi. “Drink this,” he says. Levi does. It takes effect very quickly, calming him slightly, leaving a faint tingling on his skin – something to calm him and block some of the pain. Levi doesn’t think it’s going to do very much right now.

He feels sick. He doesn’t want to do this. Wants more than anything to bolt out of that room.

He doesn’t look when Hange takes his arm. He doesn’t look when the needle is inserted, the rune cuff put on. Furlan holds his hand and Isabel rubs his back and then Erwin asks him to lie down and Levi can’t fucking do it.

He can’t breathe and his magic is screaming and Levi can’t make himself do it, desperately doesn’t want to do this.

“Come on, Lee,” Furlan says, nudging him.

And Levi shakes his head, keeps his eyes shut, turned away from Hange. He squeezes Furlan’s hand, can already feel tears starting to prick at his eyes. _Pathetic_ , he thinks, and yet he can’t force himself to do it, can’t force his breathing to slow, can’t do anything but try to ride out the overwhelming waves of alarm and danger on top of his own fear. Try to keep images of Kenny holding him down and the feeling of his wrists bleeding, tugging over and over against restraints, out of his head.

“Can’t you do that projection thing again?” Isabel says. “Levi, he can do it, can’t he?”

Levi knows before Erwin says anything that he won’t be able to – Levi’s magic is going absolutely berserk, there’s no way he’ll be able to get into his head.

“I’m afraid I can’t,” Erwin says, “Levi’s magic is too frenzied right now. Afterwards, I should be able to, if he would like that.”

_Maybe_ , Levi thinks. He’s going to feel shit enough.

“Come on, Lee,” Furlan says. He presses more insistently on his shoulder. Levi sucks in a deep breath, and it takes all of his willpower to move so that he’s lying down, on his stomach.

“That’s good,” Isabel says, hand running over his back.

Levi shudders. He knows the restraints are coming next. He knows this and yet when he feels the zing of magic against his wrist he flinches back anyway. He fucking hates them – finds the sudden loss of access to his magic terrifying in the worst way. Hates being held in place almost as much. His magic is still there, still in his body and in his head, doesn’t stop the clamoring, but the sense of danger becomes dulled – it only blocks the more outward forms of his magic, will keep it locked in his own body, but it’s still there.

He flinches when the metal touches his skin but it’s the hand Furlan is holding and he keeps Levi from drawing it in. Levi can’t stop the scared noise that comes up his throat when he feels his access cut off.

“Easy, easy, you’re alright,” Furlan says. The metal goes around his other wrist. He feels them lock into place, tugs at them and can’t move, magic keeping them in place. “Bite this,” Furlan says. A piece of leather between his teeth again. Levi tenses up with a surge of anticipatory panic.

It’s not quite as bad as the other sealing rituals. She doesn’t have to brand his back, for one. It’s still bad enough that it has Levi screaming, has him dizzy, pulling at his wrists enough to cut them, tears going down his face. It still leaves him, afterwards, in aching, all over pain.

He feels the restraints come off, his magic surging back, the needle, the rune cuff coming off next. He trembles and gasps, only gradually relaxing, becoming more aware of his surroundings.

“Levi – Levi did you want Erwin to do that thing?” Furlan says.

His magic feels raw – less chaotic now that it’s been sealed again, more under control, but raw, pricking painfully at him everywhere. He knows it will get worse if Erwin starts trying to get past it, far enough into his head. _No_ , he says to Furlan, reaching out with his telepathy rather than speak. He’s still got the leather in his mouth, he realizes, and Furlan reaches and takes it from him a moment later.

Erwin and Hange leave. Furlan reads a book to him while Isabel sits on the bed next to him. He’s exhausted but can’t sleep, in too much pain.

Hange and Erwin come back with food. Levi doesn’t eat any of it, still hasn’t moved hardly at all, still lying on his stomach. He drinks a little water, lets Furlan help him roll over, sit up enough to drink from a cup. Hange gives him another potion – Levi thinks the same one she gave him earlier. It helps dull the pain a bit, makes him a bit calmer. It’s enough that he’s able to sleep, finally. Enough that he’s able to enjoy, at least a bit, the relief that it’s over.


	4. Shock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Levi starts learning to control the corruption, with mixed results.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to keep the timeline easy to follow but please do pay attention to the taglines before each section. For reference, the main timeline goes from late spring to early summer in this chapter (Levi is 22).
> 
> This chapter wound up being longer than anticipated but oh well, hope you enjoy.

22 Late Summer

Underground, Devil’s Ditch

Everyone is in position. Erwin and Levi on the fourth floor of the abandoned building directly east of the Witch’s hideout. Hange hanging by her gear from the underground ceiling. Mike across the street. Isabel and Furlan waiting on the other side of the building.

A flash of light. A titan eye, staring into Erwin’s face. The floor under them moves. Citizens, farther from them, will think it is an earthquake, but Erwin knows the stomping of titans.

“Run!” Erwin yells.

But Levi is already swinging out of the window, already gone. Erwin lunges through another window before brick and concrete rains down around him, the titan smashing its hand through the building.

Levi and his friends do not have titan blades, just the ODM gear. Erwin, Hange, and Mike do though. Erwin shoots his grapples at the ceiling of the Underground, spins wide of the titan, trying to reorient, to access. _A titan_ , he cannot stop thinking. Who in their right mind would summon a titan in the Underground? The thing is almost as tall as the cavern ceiling – it’s going to cause a cave-in on a massive scale if they don’t kill it, and fast.

_What kind of witch would do this?_ Erwin thinks. _What is his motive, his plan – did he know we were coming? How?_

Erwin sees Mike swing towards the titan only to shoot abruptly away again as the thing walks straight into a building, sending projectiles flying. The titan shoots a hand up at Hange, who manages to hook into a building and shoot away just in time.

The titan’s hand connects with the underground ceiling.

There is a noise like rocking thunder, and stone and dirt crash down, sending dust up in sporadic clouds. They need to kill that thing _now_.

Erwin lands on the roof of a building and his eyes dart around, trying to find a vantage point, trying to find an angle. There’s a zip of movement in his peripheral and Erwin looks to find Levi, shooting towards the titan.

Erwin shoots out a strand of telepathy so fast he hears it ring in his ears. _Levi, get back!_ He doesn’t have blades. Yet Levi swings towards the titan, dodges a flying hand in a move that should not be possible with the gear that he has – a combination of his Earth magic manipulating the metal of the grapples and his air magic adding a speed and power that Erwin has rarely seen before.

Erwin curses and follows after him. _What is he thinking?_ You need specific, runed blades to kill a titan, nothing else will even break the skin – no matter how powerful he is, he’s going to get himself killed.

Erwin follows Levi’s trajectory in an arc around the titan, but he can’t make the maneuvers that Levi did. He’s forced to touch down on a roof, to go around a building. Erwin is in midair when he watches Levi’s feet touch down on the ceiling of the underground, push off, and launch himself towards the titan.

Levi raises his hands, and the gray of Life magic materializes there, dark gray instead of opaque like normal, the magic dense. It extends from his hands into two wide blades. Erwin’s feet touch down on a roof just as Levi spins his body, the blades flying in an arc too fast for the eye to track, and reaches the titan’s nape.

Blood spays as the blades sink into its neck, cutting the nape away, and the titan begins to fall.

Levi twists in an arc around it, headed back towards Erwin. It is that moment, as the titan begins to fall, that its arms fly up and hit the roof of the underground with the force of gravity tearing it down. Erwin looks up just as the earth above him begins to fall.

22 Late Spring

Underground, Outer East

For the two and a half weeks that Levi and his friends had stayed with them, Levi had been very ill. His body was working very hard to heal itself, and he’d been weak because of it, not to mention in constant pain. He’s been using very little of his magic as a result, and it had been a struggle to even get him to leave the infirmary room.

Erwin had almost forgotten how strong Levi really is.

Erwin realizes that he’s only felt any emotion at all off of Levi in the past weeks because Levi was so weak – as soon as he begins recovering from the sealing ritual, Erwin can feel nothing at all from him, his defenses all in place, automatic, unconscious. Three days after the sealing ritual, Levi is completely healed, and there’s a fire behind his eyes which has been absent since he first started staying with them, first found out he’d need weeks of rituals to keep the corruption in check. Erwin can feel the power off him – as strong as it was the day they met.

And the morning of day three, when Levi’s finally completely healed, he walks out of the infirmary room, expression impassive except for his eyes, which are much too light. “Hey Is,” he says, “you wanna go after this?”

Erwin looks up, because they’re eating breakfast, and Erwin knows that the three of them must be moving back to their own place again now that Levi doesn’t need daily rituals, but he hadn’t expected them to go so soon. But then Isabel’s eyes light up.

“Hell yes, Furlan –”

“Not happening,” Furlan says.

“What, why?” Isabel says.

Furlan points a spoon at Levi. “Because he hasn’t had a good fight in over two weeks – he hasn’t even used any magic for over two weeks, and I don’t feel like being target practice.”

“I’ll let you go two on one,” Levi says.

“No,” Furlan says.

“No Earth or Psychic magic,” Levi says.

“Na-uh,” Furlan says. “Isabel can get burnt to a crisp if she wants, but you are not dragging me into it.”

“It’s no fun if it’s just me, Levi-bro holds back too much,” she says. “Come on, Furlan. Big bro just got better, let’s go!”

Furlan’s frown deepens, and then his eyes land on Erwin and his face brightens. He points at Erwin. “We get Erwin on our team.”

“Teams for what, are we playing a game, I want to be on Levi’s team!” Hange says, dropping into a seat next to them.

“Levi doesn’t get a team,” Furlan says. “We need at least three people just to make it even.”

“Hm,” Hange says. “I think we should test that.” She smiles and her eyes flick to Erwin.

Erwin knows what she’s thinking. Erwin is a very powerful Psychic mage, and he is very skilled as well. He doesn’t think he’d be able to get completely in Levi’s head – doesn’t think he’d be able to paralyze him, or search his memories or cause hallucinations or control him, like he could to people without Psychic magic or who had weaker Psychic magic, but he is pretty confident that he could make it _very_ difficult for Levi to focus. Possibly difficult enough that physically they’d be on an even playing field. If Furlan and Isabel are also attacking Levi at the same time, then Erwin thinks his chances of getting completely in Levi’s head becomes a possibility.

Isabel cajoles them all into going outside, to the small dirt courtyard beyond the house. “You three start,” Erwin says.

Levi’s eyes meet his for a moment, sharp, questioning, almost suspicious, but then Isabel all but launches herself at him, and he ducks and lets her fly right over him, to skid against the ground and then launch herself up onto a wall, pushing off of it to again go sailing towards him.

She’s adapted to living in such a densely populated area, clearly, using all of the walls and buildings and surfaces to her advantage. She has a knife in hand, which makes sense – air magic is less suited for direct attacks, at least without other equipment. Furlan also wields a knife though, watching for a moment before walking forward, a very focused expression on his face.

Levi meets Isabel with a blast of air himself this time. It sends her careening off in the wrong direction. He swings his foot out and suddenly the ground beneath him shakes, a piece of it shooting up right under Furlan. It’s only about three inches of earth, just enough to make him trip.

Levi shoots Furlan a smirk before directing his attention back to Isabel. Intentional then, Erwin thinks – he could have pushed the earth up farther, but he just wanted to make Furlan trip.

Watching Levi fight is… extraordinary. Erwin doesn’t know how else to explain it. While he’s clearly holding back in terms of lethality, he’s using a lot of magic, drawing on all four elementals and his Life magic as well, all with an astonishing amount of fluidity. It’s fascinating to watch – elementals generally develop their own set of motions to go with their powers, unless taught formal methods (which is better is debatable), and Levi’s is almost bizarre.

Usually, elementals, or at least powerful elementals, avoid direct physical contact – they don’t fight with their own fists, don’t generally wield any type of weapon either – they’re strength is in their magic, so they rely on that, and want to avoid direct contact.

But Levi not only has Life magic, meaning that physical fighting is also a strength for him, but he clearly is used to fighting with some kind of weapon – a knife, Erwin thinks as he watches the moves more carefully. He’s learned to use less motion than most people do, and the motions are sometimes odd.

Only the very skilled can use elemental magic without an accompanying movement – a punch, a hand thrown out, a stomp, and more elaborate magic is generally associated with a more elaborate physical move. Levi does not use overly large movements to control his magic – sends stone shooting out of the earth with just a hand swiped upwards, as if he were swinging a knife, throws out fire with an elbow, sends a puddle crystalizing to ice by just turning his foot.

He’d learned to fight first, Erwin realizes. He learned to fight with a knife when he was still young enough that not all of his magic had manifested, so when it did, it grew around the skills he already had, got incorporated into the style of fighting that he’d already developed.

_Fascinating_ , Erwin thinks.

Levi sends Furlan to the ground, ducking from a swipe of Furlan’s knife to elbow him in the stomach, the move accompanied by enough air to send him backwards.

He’s using a ton of magic though. Way more than he needs to. Erwin suspects that it’s only because he hasn’t used any in so long – he’s going to tire pretty quickly at this rate. Erwin’s sure he doesn’t use as much normally. Hell, he definitely doesn’t have to.

“Fuck,” Furlan says, getting up and wiping the dirt off his hands onto his pants. “Alright, Eriwn, you’re up.”

Levi turns to look at him, and Isabel’s gone still too, panting where she sits on the window sill of their building, the second story. Levi’s expression is again impassive, but his eyes betray him.

“I won’t go any further than paralysis,” Erwin says. “You have my word.”

Levi raises an eyebrow. “You think you can get that far, huh?”

Erwin smiles.

With a surge, he attacks Levi’s mind.

He’s prepared for how strong Levi is. He also knows just how aggressive and combative his magic is even unconsciously, so he knows logically that Levi’s magic will be even more so when Levi’s actively trying to keep him out, but it still manages to surprise him a little bit.

The thing about Chaos magic though – the only real disadvantage – is that with so many abilities, it’s harder and takes longer to really _master_ any of them.

The raw power of Levi’s Psychic magic is impressive, but Erwin knows the second he gets near Levi’s head that Levi has not trained the way that Erwin has. He has clearly relied mainly on blunt force in the past.

The only indication that Erwin has attacked his mind and is currently in the process of tearing a whole in his defenses is the slightest twitch of Levi’s lip.

With a screech, Isabel jumps down again. Levi sidesteps, blocks with a blow of Air magic, to send her skittering away again. Furlan joins a moment later.

Erwin is surprised at how well Levi continues to fight, though it makes sense, he thinks. If Levi relies on raw power to block Psychic attacks, then he wouldn’t need as much concentration to keep up his defenses – he’s clearly used to blocking Psychic attacks while physically fighting as well, another thing that Psychic mages usually avoid. He is better at multitasking than Erwin expected.

Still, Erwin inches his way in. He sees how Levi sweats, his teeth gritting, his movements becoming more choppy. He throws up a couple of Life magic shields. Erwin’s not sure if he’s been avoiding using the grey materialization of Life magic because it uses up more energy or because it is a very powerful tool – makes the fight less challenging. He’s been using very little fire magic, and that makes an appearance too, as Furlan gets closer to getting a shot in.

Isabel and Furlan attack at the same moment and Erwin takes the opportunity to make a concentrated stab at Levi’s mind.

Levi falters, Isabel’s knife nicks his arm, Isabel pulling the swing at the last moment to avoid seriously injuring him, and Levi swings a bar of life magic at Furlan’s head. Furlan ducks easily but frowns.

“No weapons,” Furlan says. Apparently this is a rule of theirs.

“Fuck,” Levi says. Erwin’s managed to get much farther into his head. He braces for an attack, gets as much of his magic into Levi’s head as he can before Levi tries to push him out.

But Levi doesn’t try to push him out. Levi throws out a hand towards Erwin, makes a fist, and pulls it up, like a punch. Erwin sees nothing materialize, feels no burst of wind, is confused for only half a second, and then he suddenly is dropping to his knees, impossible weight tearing at his hips and thighs. It floors him, literally.

Erwin is wearing his ODM gear straps. The straps which have metal plates on them.

It breaks his concentration enough that Levi is able to push him back, nearly all of the progress he made erased.

Levi glances back at him, and Erwin grins.

When everyone’s exhausted and after everyone’s showered again, Erwin makes lunch and they all sit down in the kitchen and then Hange and Erwin exchange a look.

“So we mentioned it before,” Erwin says. “But the next step is to work on your control over the blood lust, so that you don’t find yourself killing multiple people at once – so you don’t find yourself killing anyone, ideally.”

Levi meets his eyes but there’s a frown on his face now, expression one of distaste. “And how exactly do you plan on doing that?”

“Practice,” Erwin says. “You need to learn how to ignore cravings even in the middle of a fight, to learn how to keep control.”

“It should be easier to control now that you’ve gotten it sealed recently, but the cravings might be worse or happen more often since the outer ring of your magical body is damaged.” Hange says.

“Great,” Levi says. “And how are you going to teach me to ignore cravings exactly?”

“You’ll start or continue to attack someone when the cravings hit,” Erwin says. “Someone will be there to intervene if it looks like you’ll go too far.”

“It happens too fast,” Furlan says. “Unless the goal is just to avoid killing more than one person, then Levi reacts too quickly, we won’t be able to snap him out of it.”

“We have a solution,” Erwin says. “Hange has an amulet Levi can wear. It will allow me to use my magic to feel his blood lust and incapacitate him if it peaks past a certain point.”

“What do you mean incapacitate?” Isabel says, looking suspiciously at him.

“A form of paralysis, not complete, only for a few seconds, like a shock to his magic,” Erwin says. “It won’t be comfortable but it will be much better than having to get it resealed again.”

“I told you I didn’t want you in my head,” Levi says.

“I won’t be in your head,” Erwin says. “My magic will only link to you through the amulet – it gives me a very limited range of movement, in a way.”

“And who am I supposed to fight?” Levi says. “The corruption is completely blind to Isabel and Furlan, I barely notice they’re there unless they’re right in front of me, and I’ve spent enough time around the both of you now that any craving I had against you would be weak, if it sparks at all.”

“We have a solution to that too,” Erwin says. “You’re going to fight Mike.”

Levi learns, very quickly, that he _hates_ training.

“Fucking _fuck_ , I wasn’t going to kill him,” Levi yells, throwing down his knife to grip his head in both hands. It’s a jarring buzz, like hitting your funny bone, but throughout his whole body – uncomfortable and painful. It does manage to shock him out of the bloodlust quite well though.

“You’re not supposed to have knives,” Erwin says. They’d agreed that even with the amulet it was too dangerous. Erwin wasn’t going to put Mike’s life in danger. Eventually they’d need to find someone else, someone that Levi could get in a real fight with, who he could fight with knives, who he could hurt, to teach him to control the blood lust even then, but they’d start smaller, work up to that. For now, if Levi’s confined to only using his Life magic, it’s a pretty even match.

“I forgot,” Levi says.

It’s not entirely a lie. He wasn’t going to try to kill Mike, wasn’t that far, but the craving had gotten stronger and he _wanted_ the knife in his hand, wanted the slice of a blade, the power and security it gave him, the threat.

So he’d pulled it, without thinking, because it felt good, and his magic wanted it badly. Or maybe just the corruption wanted it badly – Levi can’t always tell the difference.

Furlan walks over and picks it up. He holds out his hand to Levi. “Give me the other ones.”

Levi glares at him.

“Come on, I know you have them,” Furlan says. Levi looks away and Furlan waves his hand. “Hey, Levi, eyes.”

Levi takes a deep breath. He resists the urge to petulantly refuse to look over. He meets Furlan’s gaze again.

“Good, breathe,” Furlan says.

Levi takes another deep breath, exhales as the remnants of the bloodlust fade again, the craving subsiding. He doesn’t know why eye contact helps break him out of it, but it does.

“Knives,” Furlan says.

Levi scowls again but hands them over.

“This is giving me a headache,” Levi says.

“The amulet or the cravings?” Hange says.

“Both,” Levi says.

This is the fourth time Erwin’s stopped him. He’s never had so many cravings in a single day, never mind all in a row. It’s dizzying, makes him feel sick. It feels like it’s getting easier to set off too, the craving left unsatisfied, growing worse each time. Levi’s patience is thinning.

“Ready?” Erwin says.

“Give me a fucking minute,” Levi says, walking over to the side, where he has a glass of water. He finishes the drink. “This is the last one,” Levi says.

“Alright, that’s probably good,” Erwin says. Hange nods.

He and Mike start sparring again. It’s challenging enough that there’s a real sense of danger to it, a real adrenaline, even if Levi knows Mike won’t kill him – he’s also not holding back. Levi’s Life magic will heal him very quickly, even quicker if Mike were to help heal him, so there’s no real reason to pull punches.

Except of course that it hurts and the aggression Mike is showing completely sets off the bloodlust.

The craving hits quickly this time. It had taken a while to set off when they started – Levi doesn’t get cravings or bloodlust every time he fights, it’s somewhat random in appearance. Now it’s back right away.

Levi wants to kill. He wants to kill badly, knows how good it would feel, aches for it. He grits his teeth, tries to remind himself that this is Mike, Erwin and Hange’s friend, a man who helped to stop him from turning into a demon, but it is very hard to concentrate on both the match and fighting his cravings at the same time.

Eventually it becomes too much and Levi gives in, snaps – a split second later the jarring, painful shot goes through him.

And this time, instead of dropping to the ground, instead of jolting him out of it, it suddenly fuels Levi’s anger more.

He pauses for a second and then he surges at Mike, flames bursting out on his hands, vision tunneling in a moment. He doesn’t recognize Mike, doesn’t see anything but a threat and a target and a high.

He makes it less than a foot before the jolt goes through him again. It causes his magic to abruptly fizzle out. Only a couple seconds, then it’s back again. Levi has to fight through it. He’s angry though, the pain just fueling it more. The flames break out from his fingertips to his elbows, burn his shirt, full flames, not the little sparks and flickering candle fire that usually goes up on his skin, full, raging flames.

Another sick jolt goes through him. This time it doesn’t stop.

“Fuck – fucking,” Levi’s vision spots, he drops to his knees, flames disappearing, clutching his head. He screams through his teeth. “Stop, enough, _enough_.”

It goes on another second. Then it ends.

Levi pants on the ground, gasps. He tries to get his breathing under control, blink back the reflexive water in his eyes. Isabel kneels in front of him.

“Big bro, look up,” Isabel says.

Levi shakes his head, head still down. “It’s gone – it’s – I’m fucking calm.” He breaths another couple moments only to look up and fix a scathing look at Erwin. “What the fuck was that? You said a jolt, you said a couple seconds.”

“You kept attacking,” Erwin says. “You had flames a foot high, you were trying to kill him and you didn’t stop even after two shots.”

Levi growls but stands up. He shoots a cursory look over at Mike. “Sorry,” he says.

Mike just nods. Levi glares some more at Erwin as he starts walking towards the door.

“I’m sorry,” Erwin says, “I didn’t have much choice.”

Logically, Levi realizes this as well. Illogically, he feels like he might vomit and his head is killing him. He’s in a bad mood and Erwin seems like a good candidate for his anger.

“Whatever,” Levi says. He tears off the amulet that had been tied around his neck. He presses it roughly to Erwin’s chest when he walks by.

22 Early Summer

Underground, Seventh Circle

It’s four weeks after the sealing ritual, four weeks of trying to increase his self-control, only one week of going out with Erwin to pick fights with random people rather than fighting Mike, and Levi still feels that he’s made little progress. He’s gotten better at fighting through the cravings, but it’s hard for him to focus on both resisting the craving and fighting, and he doesn’t feel the cravings any less. He hates going out, hates the feeling of cravings, hates fighting them even more.

The only upside is that once they’re gone, they’re gone. It’s not an addiction – he only feels the desire to kill at all when he gets the cravings. Normally this happens a couple times a week. It had never really bothered him before – they were unpleasant, because he ached to kill, had to fight not to, but they were usually brief and sporadic, so it wasn’t a big deal. Now he’s intentionally getting four or five cravings a day, four or five times a week. They wear on him.

It doesn’t help that he’s starting to associate them with pain. He still rarely is able to fight his way through the craving entirely – he usually gives in. It will pass, even if he’s still fighting someone the whole time, but he rarely makes it that far. Which means as soon as a craving hits, his body tenses up in anticipation of the jolt which Erwin will give him. He swears his body knows it’s coming – it starts making him anxious.

In a moment of weakness, he divulges this information to Isabel. He’s lying down in his bed at night, had gone to bed early with some tea, said he was going to read for a bit, but then he’d just lay down, blankets drawn up, staring at the wall.

He hears the door creak and feigns sleep. Soft footsteps – he knows it’s Isabel, can feel her presence with his Psychic and Life magic. She sits down on the edge of his bed, and then Levi feels her fingers on his scalp, combing through his hair.

It’s such a tender gesture, and Levi still isn’t used to her and Furlan being so gentle, so comforting towards him. There is a part of him that hates it. He’s not fragile, not a child, hates feeling vulnerable and doesn’t want help, doesn’t want to be anything but entirely self-sufficient. But there is a larger part of him which is hurting and desperate, scared of what he now needs to do to stave off the corruption, a painful, despairing dread.

So he doesn’t move as she keeps combing through his hair. “Are you okay, big bro?” she says.

Levi doesn’t know why his stomach clenches at the question, a sharp pain in his chest. He wants to answer yes and yet doesn’t. His mouth stays closed. He feels like shit. He’s felt shit for a month and a half now. He’s so fucking tired, feels like he’s trapped in a nightmare – he’d thought it be over once he got through the two weeks of hell, two weeks of three rituals a day, had seen it like the light at the end of the tunnel, had held onto that.

Battling cravings is still much, much better than the three rituals a day, but Levi’s fucking exhausted now, and there’s no real end in sight. He’s getting better at fighting cravings but he’s not anywhere close to where he needs to be. They’re pushing him to train more, to gain control as quickly as possible, just in case something happens – if he got jumped again, if he got in a fight again right now, he could kill three people and turn.

And that’s just another looming presence. He’s going to turn into a fucking demon, a mindless, bloodlusting demon, if he keeps this up.

(Levi would be lying if he said he’d never thought about it. Lying if he said he hadn’t considered how he would kill himself, if it came down to that.)

“Tell me about it,” Isabel says.

“About what?” Levi says.

“How you feel, stupid.”

It almost makes Levi smile. He turns onto his back, so he’s no longer facing the wall, looking up at Isabel instead.

“It’s fine,” he says.

She gives him a very unimpressed look.

“I hate training,” he says, gives in, partially. “The cravings are fucking awful and Shit Brows’ jolts are painful and so fucking uncomfortable, makes me want to tear out of my own skin.”

She keeps touching his hair. She won’t say “I’m sorry” and he’s grateful. “It’s okay if you don’t feel well,” she says, and Levi can’t tell if it’s in response to what he said or what he didn’t say.

He doesn’t know what possesses him to keep talking. Maybe it’s that she’s not pushing, not asking for anything, or that he’s tired and dreading the training that will happen tomorrow. Maybe he’s just fucking weak, he thinks bitterly afterwards. “They make me –” he says, abruptly, “they make me… nervous now… the – it feels awful, the cravings.”

He wants to tell her suddenly, because that scares him too – he doesn’t know why it’s happening, is such an involuntary, uncontrollable response, and it’s only been getting worse.

She nods, but frowns. “The cravings scare you? Because you can only kill two people, and you’re afraid of turning?”

“No,” Levi says. He closes his eyes for a moment. “No, it’s – it’s stupid, it’s not rational. I think it’s because of the jolt Erwin gives me. I think it’s – the craving hits and I know it’s coming, and it feels awful, and the cravings are fucking terrible enough already, and now they make me anxious too.”

Isabel nods again. And then she hugs him. Except he’s lying down, so it’s more like she just flops down to lie on top of him. He lets out a huff at the weight, hands coming up to wrap around her back too.

“You’re so strong, big bro,” she says, and it’s about the last thing Levi was expecting. He just blinks for a moment.

“What the hell about me telling you I’m scared all the time now makes you say that?” he says. “It’s fucking pathetic, Isabel,” he says.

“Don’t say that,” she says. “You keep going anyway even though it’s so hard, even though it hurts and you hate it and it scares you.”

Levi lets out a long breath, runs his hand down Isabel’s back for a moment. “Thanks, Is,” he says, voice very quiet.

“Love you, big bro,” she says. There’s a beat of silence, and she squeezes him in the sort-of-hug, and then she leans up so she can look at him again. “Now come back out to the living room, Furlan’s been pacing for a fucking hour.”

Levi snorts and lets Isabel drag him back out of bed.

22 Early Spring

Underground, Seventh Circle

“Levi, you have to get it sealed again,” Furlan says.

Levi continues washing the vegetables he got at the market, facing away from Furlan, and says nothing.

Furlan tries to keep his voice gentle, though steadfast. “I know it sucks, I know it’s really, really fucking awful, but you’ll need it soon anyway, and your control is getting worse now. Let’s go get it done before it gets bad again.”

Levi says nothing, but Furlan sees the way his shoulders tense.

“Me and Isabel will be there with you,” Furlan says. “I was thinking I’d go see the Witch and ask if she could come here, if she could do it here, so you can be in your own bed, so afterwards you don’t have to go anywhere and you don’t have to stay with her.

Levi puts the vegetables down abruptly and walks away, out of the kitchen and towards the bedroom that they share. Furlan follows after him, moving quickly to keep pace.

“I was thinking we’d get you medicine this time, something for the pain,” Furlan says. “I know it won’t block it all, but we’ve got enough money saved, we can afford to get something good, something that will help make it easier.”

“I don’t need it yet,” Levi says, tight and hard, and it would sound angry except that Furlan knows him better than that.

“Lee, it won’t be any easier three months from now,” Furlan says, voice dropping, going softer. “Let’s just get it over with before it becomes a problem.”

“I don’t need it yet,” Levi says again. He tenses, and then finally turns to him. His expression is smooth but there’s distinct fear in his eyes.

Furlan feels the telepathic link open up, feels it like a small ping against his mind, soft, a familiar connection. He waits a moment, but Levi doesn’t say anything, like he can’t find the words.

_I know,_ Furlan says instead. Levi’s always used telepathy over spoken words when it’s a difficult topic, when he feels vulnerable. _I know it sucks,_ Furlan says. _I know it’s terrifying._

_It’s agonizing._

_It’s only ten minutes though,_ Furlan says, _a couple days to recover, and then it’s over. And you won’t have to worry about it for another six years._

“I really don’t need it yet,” Levi says out loud, though his voice is quiet. “I can feel it, but it’s not – I’m not losing control.”

“Not yet,” Furlan says. “You shouldn’t wait until you are, Levi. It’ll be better to just get it over with – before things get bad.”

_It’s so fucking painful,_ Levi says. It comes out fast, and telepathic thoughts don’t sound quite the same as someone’s real voice, but Furlan can still hear the fear in the words. _It’s so, so fucking painful, Furlan._

“I know,” Furlan says, quietly, “I’m sorry.”

_Feels like being burned alive, like being stabbed over and over again, like breaking all your bones at once, like your skin is being torn off, skinned alive._

It comes out in a rush and Furlan’s not sure Levi meant to send it all over the link. He does that sometimes when he’s anxious or focused on something else. _I’m sorry, Levi,_ Furlan says. He tries not to grimace, tries not to let the helplessness he feels seep into the words.

22 Early Summer

Underground, Fifth Circle

The Red Eye gang controls most of Fifth Circle, which is just west of Seventh Circle, where Levi, Furlan, and Isabel live. They aren’t part of any gang, but they hold territory in the sense that no gangs try to take over the area where they live. Levi’s known to be a Chaos mage, and that in itself would keep people away, but he and Furlan, and later Isabel as well, grew a reputation as violent and powerful.

They take a lot of jobs that Red Eye would otherwise get. They also occasionally go after illegal goods in Red Eye territory. The gang really does not like them, and Levi won’t usually go into Fifth Circle alone. Furlan and Isabel never do.

So that is where Erwin, Mike, and Levi go to train.

It’s just him, Mike, and Erwin, because Furlan and Isabel calm him down, and he needs to learn to calm himself down, to fight the cravings even when they’re not there to help. So it’s just the three of them, walking around until they find someone, or until someone finds them. Most members of Red Eye recognize him, which is both good and bad. Erwin and Mike hang back far enough that it looks like Levi’s alone. That way people will still go after them. Mike comes just in case multiple people attack at once, too many for Levi to handle on his own without significant danger. Erwin can paralyze up to about four people at once, providing none of them have psychic magic. Often at least one of them does though. They know Levi has Psychic magic, so if it’s Red Eye that attacks him, they usually bring one of their own as well.

They’re walking around the edges of Fifth Circle, almost into the Inner ring, when Levi’s attacked – three people. Levi recognizes one of them, realizes quickly that these are not the normal Red Eye thugs.

A Psychic, a Fire elemental, and a Life mage, all third tier – Red Eye or someone else has realized Levi’s been skulking around and hired them to try to kill him, Levi guesses. They’ve sent people after him before. Levi has seen the Psychic before, knows he’s a gun for hire.

Erwin takes care of him. Levi focuses on the Fire elemental and the Life mage. He draws out the fight, doesn’t take the openings given to him – it’s a pretty even fight anyway, with two of them going at him at the same time. Levi gets singed, shirt catches fire before he puts it out with his own magic, narrowly misses a blade to his side.

The craving hits. Levi wants to kill. He holds back, forces it back, but he gets more aggressive anyway, stops pulling punches, knifes one of them in the leg, nearly knocks the other out with a flying chunk of earth.

It feels like a dangerous game, trying not to tip over into bloodlust but his magic desperately trying to satisfy the craving with more and more violence, the ache to kill burning under his skin, until it turns into a haze of longing and restraint.

He’s getting close, knows he’s going to give in soon, knows he can’t take it much longer, knows Erwin’s going to shoot him with the fucking amulet. He keeps control, barely.

As the craving rings under his skin, he forms a long blade from his Life magic, the grey mist materializing into something like an arrow, or a pointed pole, and shoots it fast at the Fire mage.

He’s aiming for the Fire mage’s shoulder, just barely resisting the urge to target his chest, creates the pole fast enough and shoots it with enough speed that he’s sure he’s going to hit him.

It probably would have too. It probably would have hit the Fire elemental in the shoulder. That is, if the Life mage hadn’t stepped forward to slash his knife at Levi, thereby stepping directly into its path.

The pole tears through the Life mage’s throat before Levi can even think to dematerialize it. He feels the rush of bloodlust, the high, the searing pleasure, as the man falls to the ground, clutching at his throat where blood gushes out.

It feels great for one moment. For one moment Levi’s flying and the Fire mage is still there and he’s stepping forward, knife in hand, the euphoria making his whole body buzz, and he wants more, wants to kill again, sees the Fire mage like a prize, like a pile of money just waiting to be taken.

The jolt from Erwin and the amulet rips through him and he stops, shudders and flinches, and he’s shocked out of the bloodlust for a second, the euphoria already starting to fade.

Mike steps in. Levi is aware that Mike is stepping in front of him, going at the Fire mage, as Levi stops and stares down at the man he’s just killed.

_No_ , he thinks. _No, no, no, fuck_.

The Life mage’s eyes stare at nothing, blood no longer gushing, but dribbling down from onto the ground from his skin, the pool of blood stilling. Levi stares at it, stares as the rest of the high diminishes, as the bloodlust fades, and he’s left with only the reality in front of him.

“No,” he says. He stares down at the body, then presses his hands to the sides of his head. “No – shit, no,” he says.

He feels a hand on his shoulder and he flinches, steps out of the way with a knife coming up, stops when he recognizes Erwin. Erwin who looks back at him with a steady look, but Levi can see the resolve and reluctance underneath.

“I wasn’t trying to kill him,” Levi says. He registers the Psychic and the Fire mage running off, Mike watching them go. Levi looks back at Erwin. “I wasn’t aiming at him, I wasn’t trying to –”

“I know, Levi, I believe you,” Erwin says.

Levi feels hot. His hands are trembling. He looks from Erwin to Mike, suddenly starts tensing up, pulls more defenses around his mind, feels magic lift to settle right under his skin, ready.

“Let’s go back to our base, Levi,” Erwin says.

“It wasn’t my fucking fault,” Levi says.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Erwin says, nodding. “You did very well, Levi.”

Levi clenches his teeth. “I’m done today,” he says, “I’m going back home. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Levi,” Erwin says. “We need to go back to our base.”

Levi shakes his head, starts backing up, glances to the side, the street he’ll take back to his place. “I’ll meet you tomorrow,” he says.

“Levi,” Erwin says, his voice slower, going more careful. Mike moves a few feet to the side and Levi tracks the movement, goes a little tenser. “We have to go back to our base. We can stop by and get Furlan and Isabel. I’ll call ahead with an amulet to Hange.”

Levi’s face goes pale. “No,” he says.

“Levi, you’re going into shock,” Erwin says. “You know that’s what you’re feeling, right? You’re going into shock.”

Levi shakes his head. He’s not. He doesn’t go into shock from just killing one person. He doesn’t really go into shock unless he kills three or more. He’s not going to their base – not fucking going back there right now. “I’m not,” he says.

“You’ll go into shock easier now,” Erwin says. “You might feel it more strongly. Can you try taking some deep breaths, Levi?”

He’s breathing fast and shallow, Levi only realizes then. He clenches his hands to fists and feels flames flicker to life over his skin, little, uncontrolled ones. He tries to take a couple deeper breaths but his head is dizzy, chest hurting, like he can’t get enough air.

“That’s good,” Erwin says, calm, slow. Levi looks down. Sees the dead man. Sees his own hands shaking, sparks and tiny flames flickering up on them. “Let’s start walking, okay Levi?”

When Erwin takes a step forward, Levi lets the flames spring up on his hands, bursting into real fire, feels grey Life magic crackle into shards around him before dissolving again a second later.

“I’m not going,” Levi says.

“We’ll go get Furlan and Isabel first,” Erwin says. “They’ll come with us. It’s okay, Levi.”

Sharp pain at the click of the rune cuff, the strange woman’s needles, clutching at his mother’s shirt, the taste of the sheets as his face was pressed into the bed as Kenny held him down, two days of aching, burning pain afterwards, the sick, nauseating swell of his intuition.

Levi’s whole body starts shaking. A sudden fear washes over him and panic tightens on his throat. “No,” he says. He shakes his head. The flames on his hands go down again, turn back into the nervous, jumping candle lights.

He needs it sealed again. He has to get it sealed again.

“No – fuck – _no_ ,” he says. He can’t breathe. His chest tightens. His magic clamors, goes unstable in a second. He reaches for Furlan with his magic, doesn’t find him, not Isabel either – they’re too far away. He can’t _breathe_.

He sees Hange’s hands clasped together, feels Furlan’s hand in his, hears Isabel’s voice, telling him it’s going to be okay. He hears his mother’s lies and feels the sick wrongness coming off Kenny and the sharp, unbearable, startling pain. He can taste the dread, the horrified desperation, _anything_ to make it stop.

“Levi – Levi,” Erwin says, and it’s like Levi’s closed his eyes – Erwin’s suddenly right in front of him, hands up, nonthreatening. “Levi, you hear me? It’s just the shock. You’re okay, it’s just the shock.”

“I just had one,” he says. “I just – fuck, I just had one, I wasn’t going to have another for two months, I – fuck, _fuck_.”

He wasn’t supposed to need another sealing ritual for at least another two months, maybe three. He wasn’t supposed to need one yet. It’s only been one month. One fucking month. The last time he waited six years between sealings. And now he needs another after _one_ month.

And it’s all back, all the desperation and fear and dread and misery that he’d felt those two weeks, knowing that even when the three rituals a day were done, there was a sealing ritual waiting for him at the end – but afterwards, then it had been _over_ , it was supposed to be over.

“Levi, breathe,” Erwin says.

“I can’t do it again,” Levi says. He feels like he’d die, like he’d rather die than take one step more towards that building where Hange was waiting, where they’d chain him down and block his magic and light his body on fire.

“Levi, it’s alright,” Erwin says. “It’s going to be fine. The shock is making things feel very intense right now, that’s all. Try to breathe slowly and deeply, it’ll help.”

“I can’t – no,” he says, and his voice is going too high. He just got it all over with, just got it done, just got _out_ of that hell. He can’t possibly go through it all again right now – he desperately doesn’t want the pain, is terrified suddenly of the pain, of how it will linger, how even when the sealing is over he’ll be stuck with it for another two days, with no way out, no reprieve.

He wants to go home. He wants to go home with Furlan and Isabel, wants them both. He still can’t breathe, is reminded of when his lungs were injured by the rituals, when they’d held him down and pressed that burning, freezing amulet to his chest, how he’d struggled and couldn’t get away, the pain jolting through him until he’d cried and squirmed.

Fucking pathetic, so fucking pathetic, and he can feel the sharp panic and how he wants to run home and it’s the same thing – he can hear Kenny laughing at him, feels his face heat up with shame even as he can’t stop trembling, can’t control his breathing, can’t stop how badly he wants to close his eyes and have this whole fucking nightmare disappear.

“Levi – Levi, come on, look at me.”

Levi blinks. Erwin is closer again, right in front of him. Levi feels Erwin’s hands on his arms then, feels it like a phantom presence, numb. Erwin rubs his hands up and down, from Levi’s elbows to shoulders, looking down at him. Levi tilts his head up to meet his eyes.

“That’s it,” Erwin says. “Stay here, stay with me. You’re alright. The shock is making things more intense. It’s only the shock, you’re okay.”

Levi stares at him a moment, blinks, feels his head clear a bit as he focuses on Erwin’s eyes, clear and steady. He steps back then, out of Erwin’s hands, out of his reach. “I’m going home,” he says.

“Levi,” Erwin starts.

“That’s fine,” Mike says. Erwin stops, looks over at him, questioning, and Levi follows his gaze too. “That’s fine, right Erwin? We’ll walk with you there.”

Levi’s not listening by the end though, has already turned, already taking off at a fast walk, wants to break into a run. He’s going home, not going to the base. He doesn’t need it sealed yet. It can wait. He has to kill more than two people to break it, so he’s fine right now. It doesn’t have to be today. It doesn’t have to be this week. Maybe he can just wait. He’ll just wait, he’ll pause with the training – it’ll be fine. He wants to go home.

They follow at a distance, to the point where Levi almost forgets they’re there at all, keeps moving, single minded, numb, magic jarringly unstable, as he goes back to his own house.

When he gets there, Levi opens the door with a key and shuts it behind him again. He locks it after him, slides the deadlock. It’s less about locking Mike and Erwin out and more an ingrained habit. He turns and Furlan is already standing up.

“Levi?” he says. His brow furrows as soon as he gets a look at Levi’s face. “What’s wrong? What’s –”

There’s a knock at the door, and that is when Levi remembers Erwin and Mike.

He steps between Furlan and the door before Furlan can take a step towards it. Isabel comes out of her room, frowning, looking from Furlan to Levi.

“Hello? It’s Erwin and Mike,” Erwin says through the door.

Furlan looks at Levi, expression going more careful. “Levi?” he says.

It feels as if Levi’s magic buzzes and prickles, moving around madly. He shakes his head. He’s going to vomit, lightheaded and chest constricted. “Don’t,” he says, voice tight.

They’re both silent for a moment, and then both their expressions go heavy with realization at the same moment, and Levi realizes that Erwin is talking to them telepathically.

“Oh, fuck you,” Levi says to the door.

“Lee,” Furlan says, voice gentle and calm. He holds his hands out. “Let’s take a walk alright?”

“No,” Levi says. He doesn’t move this time, doesn’t back up. He clenches his hands again.

“Lee –”

“I’m not going, I won’t fucking go, I’m not doing that shit again, I’m not going through that fucking hell when it’s only been one fucking m-month –”

Furlan reaches Levi and hugs him and Levi squeezes his eyes shut and presses his forehead onto Furlan’s shoulder as his voice cracks.

“Okay, we won’t go. It’s alright. We’ll stay here, it’s okay.”

It feels like a daze, like he’s concussed, or sick with fever. His mind goes slow, body numb, as Furlan gets him to lie down, gets him some water. The fear and dread soften but it leaves a sick haze in its wake. Levi shivers, sips water then tea, lets Isabel lean against him. Eats some bread when Furlan brings him that.

He’s finally coming out of it, finally calming down and starting to feel a little more like himself again, when the familiar hinting dread and alarm starts up deep in his gut.

He freezes. Feels it there, solid, steady, growing. His stomach turns. He’s going to be sick.

“They’re bringing Hange,” Levi says.

Furlan winces.

By the time they get there, Levi is sitting up in bed with his head down, elbows on knees, rocking himself, eyes squeezed shut as tears roll down his skin.

He’s still in shock. It’s making it unbearable.

“Okay, it’s okay,” Isabel says, rubbing his back. Levi can’t focus on anything but the ball of panicked alarm in his stomach and the unstable, burning magic in his lungs. He’s dizzy, feels like he can’t breathe, feels like his head is going to explode and like his chest will collapse.

“I don’t wanna do this,” he says, doesn’t hear himself. Squeezes his eyes shut tighter, grips his hair, and then his arms, fingers digging into his shirt and his skin, voice hitching, as the sense of alarm heightens with every second. It’s suffocating.

“Breathe,” Isabel says. “It’s okay. It’ll be over soon, big bro.”

Levi says nothing, grips his arms tighter, rocks some more. His body feels like it’s burning. He’s going to scream.

The feeling just keeps getting worse and Levi knows it’s just the shock and his Psychic magic, but it doesn’t make it any easier to deal with, doesn’t make it less terrifying, doesn’t make it hurt any less.

Levi hears the door bang and he flinches, but then he feels Furlan’s presence, only Furlan. He sits down on the bed next to Levi.

“Here, Lee, drink this,” Furlan says.

Levi shakes his head. “I’m gonna be sick –” He realizes Furlan got the drink from Erwin and Hange – that they’re probably waiting outside somewhere, far enough away that they won’t set of Levi’s Psychic magic anymore than they already have, so he can drink the potion to calm him down a little before they come in.

“Come on, Lee, it’ll make you feel better,” Furlan says.

“I’ll do it tomorrow,” Levi says. He flinches with a stab of his intuition. “Fuck – I’ll do it tomorrow, tell them I’ll do it tomorrow.”

“Come on, Lee, drink,” Furlan says. His voice is quiet, gentle.

Levi opens his eyes only for his vision to swim, tunneled in. He feels so dizzy, looks up at Furlan as his vision focuses and goes unfocused again. “Furlan – Fur, I’ll do it _tomorrow_.”

It’s desperate. Levi can hear how desperate he sounds.

Furlan unscrews the bottle, holds it up. His voice is still so goddamn gentle. “It’ll make you feel better, Lee, I promise.”

Levi turns away, squeezes his eyes shut and clenches his teeth to stop himself from sobbing. He’s so fucking terrified, feels like he’s about to die, like Erwin and Hange really are there to kill him, like they already are, slowly, from the inside and with his own magic. He can’t think, is just in this panicking hell with his magic screaming at him so loud that he can’t hear anything else. It’s obscuring everything, his Psychic magic going ballistic, the corruption seeping into his body, making his magic completely unstable, the shock sending everything to a fever pitch.

“I can’t do this with the shock,” Levi says. “I’ll do it when it’s over. I fucking swear I’ll go when it’s over, just make them leave, Furlan, please.”

Levi feels Furlan’s hand on his back, feels Isabel’s hand against the side of his face. He keeps his eyes closed.

“They said it won’t go away this time until you have it sealed,” Furlan says.

The glass bottle is pressed to his lips and Levi drinks.

Whatever was in that bottle was not the same potion as they normally gave him, Levi realizes about two minutes after he drinks it.

“What the fuck is this?” he says.

“Huh?” Isabel says.

“Furlan what the fuck did you give me?” Levi says.

His head is slow. Everything is slow. His body is so heavy. His tongue feels weird, his voice sounds weird. He’s fucking drugged.

“She said it would counteract the shock better,” Furlan says. “It’s working then?”

“It’s making me fucking dizzy,” Levi says, closing his eyes. His voice is quiet. He feels like he can barely move. He opens his eyes again and shifts his hand so it’s on his stomach and it feels like a dead weight – like he’s cut off blood flow and it’s gone numb. “What the fuck?” Levi says, closing his eyes again.

The manic clamor of his magic has slowed too though. He feels sick and dizzy but he’s calmer, feels much better than he had before. The relief is incredible, but there’s a twisting sense of vulnerability, helplessness, and he’s very glad that Isabel’s sitting next to him, that they’re both there with him.

“Okay,” Furlan says, and Levi feels a burst, a flutter of that panicked alarm in his stomach again, but it’s dulled this time, muffled. “Hange gave me something else,” he says. Furlan hesitates a second. “She gave me a cuff to block your magic.”

“What?” Levi says. He feels another heavy rush of fear.

“To block some of your Psychic magic before they come in,” Furlan says. “So I’m gonna put that on now, okay?”

“No,” Levi says. He hates the restraints. “I don’t need it yet.”

“Yeah, I know, but it’ll make it easier when they come in, make it so your Psychic magic doesn’t freak you out so much,” Furlan says.

Levi closes his eyes. _Fuck_ , he thinks. “Fine,” he says.

He feels his magic cut out and it’s not quite as bad as usual, because he already feels slow and hazy from whatever the hell Hange put in that potion.

“Why didn’t they give this to me before?” Levi says. Furlan shrugs.

Levi still feels it when Hange and Erwin get close, his Psychic magic dulled but not completely gone. He tenses up, but the fear is his own this time, not his magic.

He really, really does not want to do this.

There’s a knock on the door and Furlan gets up to get it while Levi squeezes his eyes shut again, tries to keep breathing deeply. He tries not to think about it at all, feels his heartrate speed up anyway, even with whatever they gave him.

He hears footsteps, can’t feel them out with his magic like normal though. He opens his eyes and sees Hange smiling much too brightly and Erwin with his usual concerned, sympathetic frown that Levi hates.

“Shit,” Levi says.

“Okay, Levi,” Hange says, dragging a chair with her from the kitchen, opening up a case she’s brought. “Do you want a full seal or do you want me to just fix up the damage you did?”

“What?” Levi says.

“You didn’t break the seal and it didn’t wear out,” Erwin says, “so Hange can just strengthen the one you have, or she can redo it entirely.”

“Does it suck less to just have it fixed?” Levi says.

“Yes,” Hange says. “Less pain – but then you still have to get it resealed in another two months, maybe two and a half. If you get it resealed now you reset the clock – you won’t need another for three or four months.” She pauses before Levi can really take that in. “How’s the potion working?”

“It’s working,” he says.

Her face lights up. “Great,” she says. “It’s new. It should help.”

“What do you wanna do, Lee?” Furlan says.

“I want you to fix it,” Levi says.

He says it too fast, doesn’t think at all. He knows it’s probably a stupid choice but it doesn’t feel like much a choice at all in that moment, when he’s exhausted and upset and has spent the last hour feeling like the shock and his Psychic magic were eating him alive.

“You sure, Lee?” Furlan says.

“Yeah,” Levi says.

Hange gets the needle, the rune cuff. Levi’s Psychic magic doesn’t lessen any more, which means it’s still going to be hell, he thinks as his chest tightens. Hange takes out the other cuff, the other restraint and Levi’s stomach sinks.

It only takes one of them to cut off his access to magic. They only use two when they need to restrain him.

“It’s just a precaution,” Erwin says, and Levi wonders if he’d just known what Levi was thinking from the look on his face or if he’d felt it with his magic.

Levi lies still while they fit the second magic suppressing cuff, then the needle and rune cuff. His heartrate speeds up but whatever potion Hange gave him staves off the worst of his panic. He shuts his eyes and squeezes Furlan’s hand when Hange says she’s going to start.

Normally with the sealing rituals, there is a jarring, blinding shock of pain the second that it starts. Levi tenses up for it, feels a rush of adrenaline fueled panic, but he feels only a small, stinging pain in his arm, the inside of his elbow where Hange inserted the needle. He slowly untenses, opens his eyes.

Furlan and Isabel watch him with the same looks of barely concealed tension. Erwin stands behind them, the same look that’s always on his face when Levi has rituals. Levi feels himself relax a bit more. The stinging sensation spreads from the inside of his elbow up his arm – slow enough that Levi can catalogue the change, but still fairly quickly. It spreads from his elbow down to his fingertips at the same time as it reaches his shoulder, then starts spilling out down his chest and back. It reaches up his neck and Levi tenses, cringes, when he feels it spread to his head and face. It’s not overly painful, but it feels incredibly uncomfortable over particularly sensitive areas – his face, especially his eyes, the back of his neck, the pads of his fingertips, his scalp, his groin, the bottoms of his feet and the backs of his knees – it’s a stinging, pricking sensitivity that has him tensing up against the feeling.

He squeezes Furlan’s hand with his right hand and lifts his left to his face, rubs over his eyes with a deepening cringe. Once the stinging sensation finishes spreading to his entire body, it starts growing more intense. Levi’s heart beats faster and he fights to keep his breathing slow, to not panic as the sensation which had been more uncomfortable than anything grows definitively painful.

His eyes are still the worst, and Levi rubs at them some more, lets out a noise when the feeling intensifies some more. He lets go of Furlan’s hand to rub at his eyes with both hands, and with increasing desperation, to try to rub away the sensation, alleviate the pressure.

He doesn’t feel the hand on his arm until Furlan starts tugging it down. Levi resists the movement, continues pressing at his eyes, the feeling growing to uncomfortable, skin-crawling and painful levels in other areas as well now. He presses his head back against the pillow, stops rubbing at his face for a moment to grasp at the back of his neck. He lets out a noise.

“Easy, Lee,” Furlan says.

Levi’s eyes start _burning_. They water and Levi presses the heels of his hands against them, curls his fingertips into his scalp too, the tips of his fingers also starting to burn.

“My eyes,” Levi says.

“It’ll be over soon. You’re okay, it’s only for a little more,” Furlan says.

“They’re _burning_ ,” Levi says. “Fur, it – ah-h.”

“It’ll stop soon,” Furlan says. “It’s okay, it’s almost over.”

Levi lets out a choked scream, presses his hands harder into his face. His skin is starting to feel like he’s pouring alcohol on a scrape. He starts shifting, squirming as the bottoms of his feet, his knees, his groin, catch up, intensifying as well.

“Levi, you need to ease up, you’re going to hurt yourself,” Erwin says. Levi feels hands on his arms again a moment later. He fights to keep his hands where they are, lets out a yell when they’re pulled away, to his sides. He feels the restraints lock in place a moment later.

Levi tugs at his arms, presses his face into the pillow, lets out a scream. “It hurts,” Levi says. He gives a vicious pull at both his wrists, feels the metal cuffs dig into his skin. “Fuck, let go, my _eyes_.”

“It’s alright Lee, your eyes are fine, it just hurts now, it’ll end soon,” Furlan says.

“It’s okay, big bro,” Isabel says

Levi opens his eyes. His vision is hazy, clouded. He can’t quite tell if it’s the dizziness or the tears or if it’s the ritual.

“Fucking – shit,” Furlan says.

Levi lets out another noise of pain, closes his eyes again.

“Erwin – Levi, open your eyes again for a sec, okay, open your eyes,” Furlan says.

Levi does. It doesn’t make the pain any worse or any better. He looks around blindly.

“It’s alright,” Erwin says. “It doesn’t mean anything bad.”

It goes on for another few minutes. Then it finally starts to abate, slowly, the way it started. Levi stills, slowly untenses, feels the pain fade back to uncomfortable stinging, and then slowly retreat back to his arm. It leaves behind an ache this time, his skin sensitive all over, like he’s bruised it. His eyes keep burning, albeit the pain is much lower. It’s the same elsewhere – his fingertips sting, even his pillow irritates the skin at the back of his neck, the bottoms of his feet feel like he’s been walking barefoot on gravel all day – his fucking dick hurts.

He blinks his eyes open, closes them again with a cringe at the light. His wrists are unlocked, the rune cuff comes off. As soon as his hands are free, he starts rubbing at his eyes again.

“Don’t rub too hard, big bro,” Isabel says.

“How do you feel, Lee?” Furlan says.

“Eyes hurt,” Levi says. He stops rubbing at them to wipe the tears off his face, only for his eyes to keep watering – a reflex from the burning sensation rather than from pain. Levi squeezes them shut and more water slips down his face. “Fuck,” he says. He wipes at his face again.

He opens his eyes again to see Furlan giving him an almost queasy expression. He glances at Isabel to see her looking similarly alarmed and Levi frowns before he closes his eyes again, rubs at them some more. The burning is starting to take on an almost itch-like feeling. “What?” he says.

“Your eyes are silver,” Furlan says.

Levi jerks his hand back down, eyes going wide, looking at Furlan. “What? _Now?_ ”

“Yeah,” Furlan says.

“It’s alright,” Hange says, “it’s just a side effect of sorts. It’ll go away in a few minutes, half hour tops.”

Normally his eyes only stay silver when he’s in the middle of a really bad blood lust, when he kills several people in a row. It’s occasionally happened without him killing someone – his most intense cravings can draw it out for a few seconds. Furlan’s told him that he’s seen flickers of it at other times, when he kills or gets lost in a craving. Levi doesn’t think it’s ever lasted more than a couple minutes though.

Levi rubs at them some more. They’ve never _hurt_ when they’ve gone silver before.

Furlan gets him a cool cloth to put over his eyes. Levi materializes some ice over his neck too. Neither help much. The potion, like Hange’s other potions, make him tired though, and as the pain starts to fade a bit more, he’s able to fall asleep.

The pain is gone by the next day, but when they ask, Levi tells them that he still doesn’t feel well. He feels a little guilty for it when Furlan buys him his favorite tea and Isabel spends an hour just sitting with him, playing with his hair while he half pretends to be asleep. Erwin, Mike, and Hange come back to check in on him and Levi’s stomach turns and he lies and says he’s still in pain. He keeps lying until it’s been three days and he knows they won’t believe him anymore.

He’s afraid of it happening again. Afraid of getting locked into that twilight state of panicked shock, of having to undergo another ritual, of the pricking, burning sensation over his eyes, of the jarring, mind-numbing pain of the full rituals. He’s much more afraid than he wants to admit.

When he does start going with Erwin and Mike training again, he doesn’t do what he’s supposed to. He barely engages anyone who would be an even moderately challenging fight – he uses his psychic magic to paralyze people much more than he normally does. He tries to get the fights over with quickly. He keeps himself in check, and he’s not sure if it’s that or if it’s just because he’s so damn nervous about it now, but he has trouble triggering the cravings and makes no real effort to remedy the problem.

“I’m bringing the potion Hange gave you, the new one, with us now,” Erwin says to him, as he hands him a vial. “And here’s some for you to keep. This way if it does happen again, and you kill someone here, you can take it right away, so the shock isn’t intense like it was.”

Levi starts putting off training. He makes excuses. He cuts their times short. He hates going, and it always leaves him in a bad mood afterwards.

“I don’t feel well,” Levi says, from where he’s still lying on his bed. It’s the third day in a row that he’s skipped going to meet Erwin and Mike to train.

“Levi,” Furlan says, frowning at him, but it’s a mix of concern and hesitance in his voice. “This is important.”

Levi says nothing. Furlan moves farther into the room, pulls over a chair and sits on it backwards, crossing his arms over the backrest and leaning his head on them just to frown at Levi some more.

“What’s going on, Lee?” he says.

_I feel shit and I want to die,_ Levi thinks but doesn’t say. He closes his eyes. He hears Furlan hesitate.

“This is seeming a lot like last time, Lee,” Furlan says. Levi keeps his eyes close and clenches his teeth just a little. _Like last time_. Furlan always says that, like he’s afraid to name it. When Levi says nothing, Furlan says, “Levi.”

“Don’t know what you mean,” Levi says.

Furlan sighs. “Come on, Levi.”

There’s a beat of silence. Levi finally opens his eyes. _I don’t know what you want me to say_ , Levi says over telepathy.

“Just tell me what’s going on,” Furlan says. “I know you’ve been hurting, Lee, just tell me what’s going on.”

“You know what’s going on,” Levi says. “You’ve been here.”

“What’s going on in your head,” Furlan says.

_Is this ever going to be over?_ Levi says before he can think not to.

“Yeah, Lee,” Furlan says, with way too much gentleness, empathy in his voice. He reaches out to touch Levi’s shoulder and Levi just lets out a shuddering breath. He looks away. “It’s gonna get better soon,” Furlan says. “I know things feel shit now but you’ve just gotta get a handle on the cravings and then things will go back to normal. I know you’ll still need the seals more often but it’ll be okay. It’s just hard right now because everything is new and you still have to train all the time.”

“I’m so fucking tired of this, Fur,” Levi says. He feels pathetic as he says it, because really, it’s just a little discomfort, just a little pain, the training. He _hates_ it though. And he feels the looming sealing ritual date like a weight driving him into the ground, one that just gets heavier every day, and he shouldn’t be thinking about it so much, it’s still over a month away, but it’s like it’s just _there_ , in the back of his mind, constantly.

With a sudden decision, Levi opens the telepathic link. He doesn’t use words. He sends the feeling instead, the bone deep, heavy dread that’s laced with fear and pain.

Furlan winces. He puts a hand on Levi’s knee. “I’m sorry, Lee,” he says. “It’s gonna get better, okay? Promise. You’ll start feeling better soon. Come on, how about I go with you today, okay? I’ll walk with you there and then hang back, and after we can go to the teahouse on Court Ave.”

Levi is quiet for a beat. “Okay,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think next chapter we're going to catch up to the late summer/titan timeline and from there get more focused on the underlying plot for a bit - anyone want to guess who the Witch in Devil's Ditch is?? :)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you think, I'd love to hear your thoughts and I super appreciate the feedback and comments, they make my day!


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